Tag Archive: Guam

Helados La Tapatia, Inc. is recalling ice cream, popsicles, fruit bars and cups, adn bolis because they may be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes. No illnesses have been reported to date, but listeriosis can take up to 70 days after exposure to make someone sick.

The products include Fruit Bars, Milk Bars, Bolis, Ice Cream Containers, Ice Cream Cups, Ice Cream Sandwiches, and Frutero. The recalled products were sold in Arizona, California, Nevada, Washington, Guam, and Canada in retail stores. The products are sold under the brand names of Helados La Tapatia and Icesations.

Ten people have been killed and hundreds evacuated from their homes after extreme weather and flash floods hit southern Spain on Friday.

The flooding, caused by torrential rain after months of drought, hit areas around Murcia and Almería in the south-east and Málaga in the south.

A 52-year-old British woman is believed to be missing in Almería, according to a government official. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office said it was looking into the reports as “a matter of urgency”.

The weather brought down a motorway bridge and cars were swept away. Officials in the region said at least 600 people had been evacuated from their homes.

Spanish radio said a young boy and girl who were found drowned in a car in the town of Puerto Lumbreras were among the dead. A middle-aged woman was also killed in Lorca, which was badly damaged in an earthquake last year.

Jackie Broad, 58, said her home in Mojacar, Almería, was too high up to be flooded but she had seen cars get washed away by raging torrents of water. “The river at the bottom of our road has burst its banks. There was a lot of water, in some places up to the roofs of shops and houses.

“The water has run away now but it’s left about a foot of mud everywhere. A lot of the roads are closed so we’re having trouble getting around,” she said.

Five people have so far died in Murcia, three in Almería and two in Málaga. Five people originally declared missing have been found alive.

A tornado that also swept through the town of Gandia on Friday knocked down a ferris wheel, injuring 35 fair workers. The town hall website said 15 of the injured were seriously hurt. Local media reported that the fair had been closed to the public at the time.

The flooding disrupted transport links, with at least two motorways closed and one flight diverted to Seville from Malaga.

Spain’s weather agency said up to 245 litres of water had fallen per square metre in the area on Friday.

In 2011, a British couple died in a flash flood in Finestrat, on the Costa Blanca, after torrential rain caused a river to burst its banks.

The heavy rain is expected to continue throughout Saturday before moving towards the Balearic Islands.

A child stands at the edge of a flooded road in Lisburn, Northern Ireland. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

A man has died after being swept away by floodwater as heavy rain and thunderstorms continued to batter much of England, Scotland and Ireland.

West Mercia police said the man was overcome by the water in a stream at Bitterley, near Ludlow in Shropshire, shortly after 10.30am on Thursday.

The accident was reported by witnesses and the man’s body was found after an extensive search involving police, fire crews and the Severn Area Rescue Association.

Residents named him as maths teacher Mike Ellis, who lived in the village with his wife.

The West Midlands, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Staffordshire all suffered heavy flooding during the day.

Later the storm spread north, closing both main rail lines between England and Scotland, with the west coast mainline closed at Tebay in Cumbria and a landslip blocking the east coast line near to Berwick.

At one point the Tyne road tunnel was closed in both directions, and police warned motorists stuck in traffic to stay with their cars until emergency services reached them. Residents in several locations across Tyneside had to be evacuated.

The Environment Agency urged people to be on alert for more flash flooding across the Midlands, northern England and Scotland as the Met Office forecast outbreaks of torrential rain across central and northern parts of the country. There was a continued risk of surface flooding if drainage systems were overwhelmed by rainfall.

The heavy rain could also cause rivers to rise rapidly, the EA warned, and it advised the public to stay away from swollen rivers and not to drive through floodwater. It also urged people to check its website and Twitter feed for the latest updates and flood warnings.

There were seven flood warnings in place for the Midlands, two for the north-east, one for the north-west and one for Scotland.

Flooding has also hit Ireland, where more than 50 homes and many businesses were flooded and several thousand left without power after 50mm of rain fell in a seven-hour period across Cork.

There were fears in Northern Ireland that overnight flooding which swamped Belfast could happen again. Further downpours were forecast as thousands struggled to clean up damage caused by flooding across the city and parts of Co Antrim.

Emergency services reported receiving more than 700 callouts linked to flooding in Belfast, while the region’s water authority said it handled nearly 3,000 flood calls, and 1,000 homes were hit by power cuts.

Flooding last year killed 470 people and impacted 9.1 million others, Kamal said.

In the worst-affected area of Sindh province, in southeastern Pakistan, the waters submerged more than 4.5 million acres of farming land, damaging an estimated 80% of cash crops.

Many in the country were at that point barely recovering from massive and deadly flooding in August 2010, which left a fifth of the country submerged by water, according to the National Disaster Management Authority.

Those floods lasted for weeks, affecting more than 20 million people and leaving 1,985 people dead, Kamal said.

Much of the land inundated in 2010 was in Punjab province, Pakistan’s breadbasket, where many people live off the soil and their livestock. Great hardship followed for millions in the wake of the flooding.

Monsoon floods in Pakistan have killed 371 people and affected nearly 4.5 million, the government’s disaster relief agency said on Friday.

Pakistan has suffered devastating floods in the past two years, including the worst in its history in 2010, when catastrophic inundations across the country killed almost 1,800 people and affected 21 million.

As in 2010 and 2011, most of those hit by the latest floods are in Sindh province, where the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) said 2.8 million were affected, with nearly 890,000 in Punjab and 700,000 in Baluchistan.

Nearly 290,000 people around the country have been forced to seek shelter in relief camps, NDMA said in figures published on its website.

The floods began in early September, with nearly 80 killed in flash floods, mostly in the northwest and Pakistan-administered Kashmir.

An NDMA spokesman said the government was not yet appealing for foreign assistance.

“The government’s point of view is that the situation will be handled from own resources,” Ahmad Kamal told AFP.

More than a million acres (400,000 hectares) of crops have been destroyed by the floods across the country, NDMA said, and nearly 8,000 cattle have been killed.

UN children’s agency UNICEF, quoting a separate flood assessment, said at least 2.8 million people had been affected, including 1.4 million children, of whom more than 390,000 are under five.

UNICEF said it was providing 183,000 people a day with drinking water but warned it urgently needed more funds.

“Children from very poor families are among the worst affected by the severe flooding and they need our immediate help,” said UNICEF Pakistan Deputy Representative Karen Allen.

“UNICEF urgently needs $15.4 million to scale up its water, sanitation and hygiene response to reach around 400,000 people over the next three to six months.”

UNICEF said that according to its assessment, more than half of those affected by the floods were concentrated in just five districts, two each in Sindh and Baluchistan and one in Punjab.

It said 360,000 people had been left without shelter and three quarters of children in the five worst-affected districts were unable to go to school, either because the buildings have been destroyed or because they are being used as temporary shelters.

The UN agency voiced particular concern about children forced from their homes, saying loss of access to safe water supplies left them vulnerable to diseases such as diarrhoea, malaria, measles, polio and pneumonia.

More than 20,000 families in Sindh have been provided with hygiene kits including water purification tablets, UNICEF said, as part of efforts to prevent deadly water-borne diseases.

Torrential downpours in southern Spain have caused flash floods that have killed one person, swamped homes and swept cars down roads transformed into raging rivers. An official in the town of Alora says homes were destroyed and at least one woman was killed. Rescue workers are searching to determine if there are more victims. She did not have more details and spoke on condition of anonymity in keeping with town policy. Images in Spanish media showed wrecked cars carried away by flash floods, rivers overflowing their banks and people sweeping muddy water out of their homes. The heavy rains started early Friday morning. The hardest hit area included Alora and other nearby towns inland from the Mediterranean city of Malaga.

Epidemic Hazards / Diseases

ScienceDaily — An isolated outbreak of a deadly disease known as acute hemorrhagic fever, which killed two people and left one gravely ill in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the summer of 2009, was probably caused by a novel virus scientists have never seen before.

Collecting samples in the Jungles of Boma in 2009 after the outbreak. (Credit: Courtesy of Metabiota)

Described this week in the open-access journal PLoS Pathogens, the new microbe has been named Bas-Congo virus (BASV) after the province in the southwest corner of the Congo where the three people lived.

It was discovered by an international research consortium that included the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and University of California, Davis (UCD), Global Viral, the Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville in Gabon, the Institut National de Recherche Biomédicale, Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Metabiota and others.

“Known viruses, such as Ebola, HIV and influenza, represent just the tip of the microbial iceberg,” said Joseph Fair, PhD, a co-author and vice president of Metabiota. “Identifying deadly unknown viruses, such as Bas-Congo virus, gives us a leg up in controlling future outbreaks.”

“These are the only three cases known to have occurred, although there could be additional outbreaks from this virus in the future,” said Charles Chiu, MD, PhD, an assistant professor of laboratory medicine at UCSF and director of the UCSF-Abbott Viral Diagnostics and Discovery Center, who spearheaded the UCSF effort to identify the virus. Chiu and his team continue to work on new diagnostics to detect the virus so that health officials in Congo and elsewhere can quickly identify it should it emerge again.

One odd characteristic of the Bas-Congo virus, Chiu said, is that while a number of other viruses in Africa also cause deadly outbreaks of acute hemorrhagic fever — Ebola virus, Lassa virus and Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever virus to name a few — the new virus is unlike any of them.

Genetically it is more closely related to the types of viruses that cause rabies, which are known to infect people with a very different sort of disease — a neurological illness that is uniformly fatal if untreated but may take months to develop.

An antibody test developed in this study was applied to the one patient who survived and to others who had come into contact with him. It suggested that the disease may be spread from person to person but likely originated from some other source, such as an insect or rodent.

The identity of this animal “reservoir” and the precise mode of transmission for the virus remain unclear and are currently being investigated by Metabiota and the central African members of the consortium through the PREDICT Project of USAID’s Emerging Pandemic Threats Program. (http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/ohi/predict/index.cfm)

How the New Virus Emerged

In the summer of 2009, a 15-year old boy in a small rural community called Mangala village suddenly fell ill and developed a bleeding nose, bleeding gums and bloody vomit. He rapidly worsened, dying within three days of the first signs of illness.

A week later, a 13-year old girl who attended the same school and lived in the same neighborhood as the boy came down with a similar, serious illness. She declined just as rapidly and also died within three days. One week after that, the male nurse who cared for this girl began showing the same symptoms, and he was transferred to a hospital in Boma, a nearby port city that sits along the Congo River upstream from Africa’s Atlantic coast.

Members of the consortium, who had initiated a project to diagnose unusual cases of severe hemorrhagic fever, obtained blood samples collected from the nurse by the Congolese doctors and sent them to the laboratory of Eric Leroy, PhD, doctor of veterinary medicine at the Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville in Gabon. There the samples were tested for traces of any known virus, but nothing was found. The Metabiota scientists then solicited the expertise of Chiu at UCSF and Eric Delwart at the Blood Systems Research Institute (BSRI) in San Francisco to aid in the diagnosis.

The researchers ultimately identified a completely new virus as the cause of the mysterious illness through a powerful strategy for identifying novel pathogens known as “deep sequencing,” in which millions of DNA sequences are generated from a clinical sample and then pieced together using computer algorithms combined with human analysis.

Distinct Attributes of Bas-Congo

The Bas-Congo virus belongs to a family of viruses known as the rhabdoviruses, a large family of viruses that infect plants, insects and mammals, including humans. The most famous member of this family is the virus that causes rabies. But even among the rhabdoviruses, Bas-Congo is something of an outlier, being very genetically distinct from other members of the family.

What’s most unusual about this virus, though, said Chiu, is what it does to people.

No other rhabdoviruses are known to cause the acute, rapid and deadly hemorrhagic fever seen in the three cases in the Congo. Rabies, for instance, can be a deadly disease if untreated, but the course of rabies in humans is nothing like the rapid and deadly onset seen with the Bas-Congo virus. There is some precedent, however, for hemorrhagic disease from rhabdoviruses in the animal kingdom: fish rhabdoviruses are known to cause hemorrhagic septicemia — acute bleeding and death — in affected fish.

The third patient had enormous amounts of BASV in his bloodstream just two days after he fell ill — more than a million copies in every milliliter of blood.

The BASV sequence was also used to design an antibody test for the virus, an effort led by Graham Simmons at the BSRI, another member of the consortium. Antibodies are blood immune proteins produced in response to an infection. The antibody test allowed the researchers to screen both the third patient with acute hemorrhagic fever and other people who had come into contact with the third patient, including the nurse who cared for him in the Boma hospital. High levels of BASV-specific antibodies were found in the third patient, establishing that he indeed had been infected with Bas-Congo virus. The same antibodies were also found in the second nurse, even though he never actually became sick.

“What this suggests is that the disease may be transmissible from person to person — though it’s most likely to have originated from some other source,” said Nathan Wolfe, PhD, founder and chairman of Global Viral, and a co-author on the paper. “The fact that it belongs to a family of viruses known to infect a wide variety of mammals, insects and other animals means that it may perpetually exist in insect or other ‘host’ species and was accidentally passed to humans through insect bites or some other means.”

The research consortium includes San Francisco-based Global Viral, Metabiota, UCSF, BSRI, as well as researchers with the Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville in Gabon; the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement in Montpellier, France; the Institut National de Recherche Biomédicale, Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, TX; the University of California, Davis; the University of California, Los Angeles; Stanford University; and the Howard Hughes Medical Center.

This work was funded by support from Google.org, the Skoll Foundation, the government of Gabon, Total-Fina-Elf Gabon, and the Ministère des Affaires Etrangères et Européennes de la France, the U.S. Department of Defense Armed Forces Health Surveillance Center, Division of Global Emerging Infections, Surveillance Operations (AFHSC GEIS) and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency Cooperative Biological Engagement Program (DTRA-CBEP), and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Emerging Pandemic Threats Program, PREDICT project. Additional funding was provided by the National Institutes of Health provided via grant numbers R01-HL083254, R01-HL105770, R56-AI089532, and R01-HL105704 and by an Abbott Viral Discovery Award.

Riley Hospital for Children is back in operation after a mysterious illness resulted in a lockdown on Thursday. Seven adults got sick and four others were hospitalized Thursday due to an unknown substance they were exposed to inside the emergency room at Riley Hospital for Children at IU Health. All of those hospitalized have since been relased according to Riley spokeswoman, Abigail Gras. It all started with an odd smell, which Riley staff members confirmed, prompting a call to the Indianapolis Fire Department. At approximately 11:50 a.m., an IFD hazardous materials team responded, along with members of the Department of Homeland Security, to investigate a possible chemical spill inside the hospital’s emergency room. IFD spokesman Lt. Derrick Sayles later said there wasn’t a chemical spill. Crews were still trying to identify the mystery subtance that caused seven adults to fall ill at Riley, even though investigators admit they may never know what made them sick. “At this time, everything we found is inconclusive,” said Indianapolis Homeland Security Director Gary Coons at a news conference Friday afternoon.Marion County Health Department Director, Dr. Virginia Caine, confirmed the inconclusive findings, “We’ve used the most sophisticated tests that we have already,” she said. “Usually when you get to this stage, it’s very rare that you identify something later.” Riley says its hospital did everything right to respond: a major lockdown and extensive testing by Hazmat, the Health Department, even experts at the National Guard. They ruled out benzene and any gases associated with bio-terrorism. “Our monitors would pick up on any kind of chemical like that,” Coons told reporters. Thankfully, all 7 adults who were sickened reported no additional symptoms hours after exposure to the mystery substance, nor has any one else reported getting sick since it all began. Unfortunately, them may never know what made them sick. As of today, health officials report that we may likely never know what noxious substance triggered the hospital lockdown and caused people to get sick.

Biohazard name:

Unidentified illness

Biohazard level:

2/4 Medium

Biohazard desc.:

Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.

Climate Change

Glaciers on Svalbard are retreating rapidly. Credit: William D’Andrea (Phys.org)—Summers on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard are now warmer than at any other time in the last 1,800 years, including during medieval times when parts of the northern hemisphere were as hot as, or hotter, than today, according to a new study in the journal Geology.

“The Medieval Warm Period was not as uniformly warm as we once thought—we can start calling it the Medieval Period again,” said the study’s lead author, William D’Andrea, a climate scientist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. “Our record indicates that recent summer temperatures on Svalbard are greater than even the warmest periods at that time.” The naturally driven Medieval Warm Period, from about 950 to 1250, has been a favorite time for people who deny evidence that humans are heating the planet with industrial greenhouse gases. But the climate reconstruction from Svalbard casts new doubt on that era’s reach, and undercuts skeptics who argue that current warming is also natural. Since 1987, summers on Svalbard have been 2 degrees to 2.5 degrees C (3.6 to 4.5 degrees F) hotter than they were there during warmest parts of the Medieval Warm Period, the study found. Researchers produced the 1,800 year climate record by analyzing levels of unsaturated fats in algae buried in the sediments of Kongressvatnet lake, in western Svalbard. In colder water, algae make more unsaturated fats, or alkenones; in warmer water, they produce more saturated fats. Like pages in a book, the unsaturation level of fats can provide a record of past climate. So far, most Arctic climate records have come from ice cores that preserve only annual layers of cold-season snowfall, and thus cold-season temperatures. But lake sediments, with their record of summertime temperatures, can tell scientists how climate varied the rest of the year and in places where ice sheets are absent. “We need both ice core and lake sediment records,” said Elisabeth Isaksson, a glaciologist at the Norwegian Polar Institute who was not involved in the study. “Here, Billy has found something that tells a different, more detailed story.” In looking at how summers on Svalbard varied, researchers also discovered that the region was not particularly cold during another recent anomalous period—the “Little Ice Age” of the 18th and 19th centuries, when glaciers on Svalbard surged to their greatest extent in the last 10,000 years and glaciers in many parts of Western Europe also grew.They suggest that more snow, rather than colder temperatures, may have fed the growth of Svalbard glaciers.

Evidence from tree rings and ice cores shows that southern Greenland and parts of North America were warmer from 950 to 1250 than today, with the Vikings taking advantage of ice-free waters to settle Greenland. Some regions also saw prolonged drought, including California, Nevada and the Mississippi Valley, leading some scientists to coin the term Medieval Climate Anomaly to emphasize the extreme shift in precipitation rather than temperature. A natural increase in solar radiation during this time was responsible for warming parts of the northern hemisphere, with a rise in volcanic activity from 1100 to 1260 causing milder winters, University of Massachusetts scientist Ray Bradley explained in a 2003 Perspective piece in Science. Bradley is a co-author of the Svalbard lake sediment study. Western Svalbard began to gradually warm in 1600, the researchers found, when the northern arm of the Gulf Stream, known as the West Spitsbergen Current, may have brought more tropical water to the region. In 1890, the warming began to accelerate, with researchers attributing most of the warming since about 1960 to rising industrial greenhouse gas levels. Ice cores from Svalbard, by contrast, show a slight cooling over the last 1,800 years. The conflicting evidence suggests that temperatures may have fluctuated more sharply between winter and summer, said Anne Hormes, a quaternary geologist at the University Centre in Svalbard who was not involved in the study. D’Andrea and his colleagues dated their lake cores by analyzing grains of glass spewed by volcanoes hundreds of miles away in Iceland. Those past eruptions— Snæfellsjökullin 170, Hekla in 1104 and Öræfajökull in 1362—all left unique chemical time markers on Svalbard’s lake sediments. “We know fairly precisely when these eruptions occurred, which is rare in the geologic record,” said study co-author Nicholas Balascio, a scientist at University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Recent temperature measurements show that the Arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet, with sea ice this summer shrinking to its smallest extent on record. Natural feedbacks are amplifying the warming as loss of reflective sea ice causes the ocean to absorb more of the sun’s energy, melting more sea ice, which causes more energy absorption, and so on. Climate models suggest that by 2100 Svalbard will warm more than any other landmass on earth, due to a combination of sea-ice loss and changes in atmospheric and oceanic circulation, according to the International Panel on Climate Change 2007 report. In a study published last year in the journal Advances in Meteorology, Norwegian researchers estimate that average winter temperature in Svalbard could rise by as much as 10 degrees C, or 18 degrees Fahrenheit.

Sinkhole

Is the growing sinkhole crises at Bayou CorneLouisiana worsening? Is the state of Louisiana, the feds and Texas Brine Company doing enough to protect the area, the residents and the region?

On Tuesday, a 30 x 50 section caved in pulling down more trees and part of an access road.

According to the Advocate, “Other developments regarding the sinkhole emergency have emerged in recent days, state and parish officials said:

Sonar testing results of a damaged Texas Brine salt cavern and samples of material found in the cavern are being analyzed to better understand what happened to the cavern suspected as the cause of the sinkhole.

Testing of hydrocarbon liquids from a Texas Brine investigatory well into the cavern may provide a definite link between the cavern and the sinkhole.

Another location where natural gas bubbles to the surface of area waterways emerged and samples of its gas emissions have been captured for testing.

In announcing their cavern sustained damage, Texas Brine officials said Monday that a tool used to measure the depth of the underground cavern found its floor is 1,300 feet shallower than when it was plugged and abandoned in mid 2011. That new, shallower point is 4,000 feet underground.

The company said the findings indicated “some type of dense material has fallen to the bottom of the cavern.”

Parish and Louisiana Department of Natural Resources officials are trying to get a better idea about the nature and amount of material found Monday inside the 20-million-barrel salt cavern, said Patrick Courreges, DNR spokesman.

The sinkhole has been in existence now since August 3 of this year, prior to Hurricane Isaac.

According to environmental attorney Stuart Smith, something smells. Smith, who has been critical of the state and Texas Brine and others, stated today in a emailer sent to the public:

The Louisiana Office of Conservation Commissioner James Welsh ordered Texas Brine Co. of Houston Tuesday to turn over all studies and data supporting its claim that tremors caused the failure of the company’s salt cavern in Assumption Parish, the agency said.

The order, which threatens fines or penalties for noncompliance, follows Texas Brine’s statement late Monday night that regional seismic activity damaged an abandoned company salt cavern that has been suspected as the cause of a 4-acre sinkhole erupting near the Bayou Corne community.

You read that correctly. Remember, this is the site were Texas Brine warned state officials more than a year and a half ago that there might be problems with the cavern’s integrity, and then neither the company nor the state lifted a finger this summer when the ground began to shake and gases began bubbling up from underground. And yet now Texas Brine is trying to pull a fast one by claiming the earth tremors caused the cavern to sink — not the other way around.

A federal official called out the company’s claim as preposterous:

But, in Tuesday’s statement from the Office of Conservation, researchers also studying the quakes disputed that claim.

William Leith, U.S. Geological Survey senior adviser for earthquake and geologic hazards, said that the USGS consensus is that the seismic activity detected in the area is a consequence of the cavern collapse, not the cause of the collapse and sinkhole/slurry area, the office’s statement says.

The bottom line just keeps growing bigger in Bayou Corne, and the ultimate bottom line is this: Somebody is going to have to pay for both the environmental carnage and the psychological stresses have been dumped on this small bayou community. Now Texas Brine has the audacity to portray this as an act of God, when clearly this crisis was created by humans acting recklessly. Even if the sinkhole swallows the entire town, it can’t swallow the truth.

Two strong earthquakes have struck north-western Iran, leaving at least 50 people dead and hundreds more injured, officials say. The quakes struck near the city of Tabriz and the town of Ahar, but most of the casualties are thought to be in outlying villages. Reports say phone lines to many villages have been cut off, making rescue efforts harder. The US Geological Service measured the quakes at magnitude 6.4 and 6.3. “The quake has created huge panic among the people,” one resident of Tabriz told the BBC. “Everyone has rushed to the streets and the sirens of ambulances are everywhere.”

Yerevan, August 11, ARMENPRESS: Shocks were registered in the territory of Armenia. As “Armenpress” reports according to the data of the European-Mediterranean Seismological Service a strong earthquake was registered in Iran 63 km to the east of the city Tavriz on 60 km depth.

Shocks were felt in different administrative regions, also in Region Syunik. The Crisis Management Center of the Armenian Ministry of Emergency Situations informed that shocks were registered in the whole republic territory. Details are being specified.

TEHRAN — Rescue teams in northwest Iran strived Sunday to dig survivors out of the rubble of villages levelled by twin earthquakes that killed at least 180 people and injured more than 1,300, according to officials.

With telephone communications disrupted in the disaster zone, northeast of the city of Tabriz, emergency teams were relying on radios and travelling in person to hard-hit villages to rescue and assess the destruction.

The quakes, which struck Saturday within 11 minutes of each other, measured 6.2 and 6.0, according to Tehran University’s Seismological Centre.

The US Geological Survey, which monitors seismic activity worldwide, ranked them as more powerful, at 6.4 and 6.3 on the moment magnitude scale, respectively.

“Unfortunately, the toll is mounting and we are now at 180 dead,” Khalil Saie, the head of the regional natural disasters centre, told state television. He put the number of injured at 1,350.

“Up to now, there are no deaths reported in the cities and all the victims come from rural areas,” he said.

Earlier he urged residents in the zone not to panic, reassuring them that “help is arriving and rescuers are already at the scene.”

Iran’s Red Crescent took over a sports stadium to shelter the 16,000 people left homeless or too afraid to return indoors, the Fars news agency reported.

It also provided 3,000 tents, blankets and tonnes of food — all a sign of years of preparedness in a nation prone to sometimes catastrophic seismic activity.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s office posted a statement on its website expressing condolences to those in the disaster zone and calling on authorities to “mobilise all efforts to help the affected populations.”

According to the official IRNA news agency, 66 rescue teams were at work, using 40 devices and seven dog squads to detect buried survivors. Some 185 ambulances were sent to the area.

Those hurt were taken to hospitals in Tabriz and Ardebil, the two biggest nearby cities, both of which escaped relatively unscathed from the quakes.

In contrast, villages outlying the towns of Ahar and Varzaqan, 60 kilometres (40 miles) from Tabriz, were decimated, being closest to the epicentres of the two quakes. Dwellings close to Heris, another town close by, were also badly shaken.

Residents in the region were terrified as their homes shook around them when the quakes hit, and they fled into the streets for safety, according to reports.

Tehran University’s Seismological Centre said the first earthquake occurred at 4:53 pm (1223 GMT) at a depth of 10 kilometres.

The second — actually a big aftershock — rumbled through from nearly the same spot. A series of more than 17 smaller aftershocks rating 4.7 or less rapidly followed.

The disaster zone was located around 90 kilometres from the borders with Armenia and Azerbaijan, and around 190 kilometres from the border with Turkey.

Iran sits astride several major fault lines and is prone to frequent earthquakes, some of which have been devastating.

The deadliest was a 6.6-magnitude quake which struck the southern city of Bam in December 2003, killing 31,000 people — about a quarter of the population — and destroying the city’s ancient mud-built citadel.

A floating mass of the volcanic rock, pumice, reportedly covering 25,000 square km, has been found floating in the South Pacific, indicating a third volcano is active near New Zealand. The New Zealand Defense Force (NZDF) said Friday the floating pumice, measuring 250 nautical miles long and 30 nautical miles wide, was first spotted by a New Zealand air force Orion on a maritime patrol from Samoa to New Zealand. The Orion relayed the information to New Zealand navy vessel HMNZS Canterbury, which spotted the pumice late Thursday about 85 nautical miles west southwest of Raoul Island, one of the Kermadec Islands that lie 750 to 1,000 km northeast of New Zealand. Lieutenant Tim Oscar, a Royal Australian Navy officer on exchange with the Royal New Zealand Navy, described the pumice as “the weirdest thing I’ve seen in 18 years at sea.” “The lookout reported a shadow on the ocean ahead of us so I ordered the ship’s spotlight to be trained on the area,” Oscar said in the NZDF statement. “As far ahead as I could observe was a raft of pumice moving up and down with the swell,” he said. “The rock looked to be sitting 2 feet (60 cm) above the surface of the waves, and lit up a brilliant white color in the spotlight. It looked exactly like the edge of an ice shelf.”

Oscar said he had been briefed by a volcanologist from New Zealand’s Institute of Geological and Nuclear Science (GNS Science) the previous day when the ship encountered another area of pumice from an undersea volcano. “I knew the pumice was lightweight and posed no danger to the ship. Nonetheless it was quite daunting to be moving toward it at 14 knots. It took about three to four minutes to travel through the raft of pumice and as predicted there was no damage,” he said. “As we moved through the raft of pumice we used the spotlights to try and find the edge – but it extended as far as we could see. ” HMNZS Canterbury was en route to Raoul Island with a party of GNS scientists aboard at the time. The Commanding Officer, Commander Sean Stewart, changed course to intercept the pumice and retrieve samples, which would be analyzed to determine which volcano they came from, said the statement. According to GNS Science, the underwater volcano, Monowai, had been active along the Kermadec Arc and the pumice could be a result of that activity, said the NZDF statement. The find comes after eruptions from Mount Tongariro, in New Zealand’s central North Island, late Monday and White Island, a marine volcano about 50 km off the east of the North Island, two days later. The GNS scientists aboard the Canterbury believed the volcanic activity of Tongariro, White Island and along the Kermadec arc was unrelated, said the NZDF statement.

Rain-triggered mudslide engulfed a village trapping over 100 people even as nine people were killed and four others found missing after Typhoon Damrey caused havoc in northeast China’s Liaoning Province. The typhoon temporarily disrupted rail services in the province on Saturday, affecting more than two million people. Nine people were killed and four others found missing after Typhoon Damrey caused heavy damage in China’s Liaoning Province over the weekend. Six people were killed in Xiuyan City, where the typhoon has cut off electricity, paralysed road traffic and damaged drinking water facilities. More than 110,000 people have been left homeless. In the city of Benxi, heavy flooding on the Sandaohe and Xihe rivers trapped more than 300 construction workers in a tunnel Monday. Fire fighters tried to connect a ropeway in an effort to pull the workers out of the tunnel.

A tropical wave killed two people in Trinidad as it lashed the eastern Caribbean with heavy rains and wind, authorities said Saturday. The victims died after heavy rainfall unleashed floods and mudslides in Trinidad’s western suburb of Diego Martin, relatives said. The dead were identified as 66-year-old Solomon Britto and 31-year-old Everold Bentham. Bentham’s sister, Liz Bentham, told reporters that floodwater surged through their community early Saturday and that her mother and sister were able to leave the house. She said Everold Bentham initially left with them but that he returned to retrieve something from the house and died. Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar is visiting the area and is expected to soon provide an update on the deaths and property damage. Meteorologists had warned of heavy rains this weekend associated with the tropical wave that’s expected to dissipate after passing through the eastern Caribbean. The U.S. National Hurricane Center said the tropical wave was located about 40 miles east of Barbados and moving west at 25 mph with winds of 35 mph. The hurricane center canceled a tropical storm watch for the eastern Caribbean late Saturday morning.

Manila Underwater as City Inundated with Floods (LinkAsia: 8/10/12)

Although Typhoon Haikui just brushed past the Philippines, it was enough to push the already-waterlogged Manila past its breaking point. The city was hit with the worst floods it has seen in decades, forcing nearly a million people from their homes. Footage from Reuters.

A lightning strike occurred as people gathered for evening prayers, police said

Lightning struck a tin roof shed that was doubling as a mosque, police said

The strike occurred in Saraswati, some 200 kilometers from the capital of Dhaka.

Dhaka, Bangladesh (CNN) — At least 13 people were killed and 20 wounded when lightning struck a makeshift mosque in a remote village in northeast Bangladesh on Friday, police said.

The lightning strike occurred as people gathered for a special evening prayer known as taraweeh that is conducted during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

“Multiple lightning strikes occurred during a storm when nearly 35 people gathered at a house in the village of Saraswati where they turned a tin roof shed into a makeshift mosque for the month of Ramadan as a regular mosque was far away,” Dharmapasha police chief Bayes Alam told CNN.

The village Saraswati is some 200 kilometers (124 miles) from the capital of Dhaka.

Heavy rains in recent weeks have swollen the Saraswati River, making access to the village difficult.

“As boats were the only mode of transport to go out of the village, it took several hours to take the critically wounded people to the hospital,” said Akm Mezanul Haque, the officer-in-charge of the Modhyanagar police station, who joined the rescue operation.

Of the 13 killed by the lightning strike, Mohammad Shahabuddin, the imam, and two others died at the mosque, Alam said. Ten others were declared dead at a Dharmapasha area hospital, he said.

Area residents and police took the wounded, many in critical condition, to the area hospital.

An overcrowded passenger bus lost control on a mountain road and plunged into a gorge, killing at least 32 people. Source: AP

AT least 52 people were killed and 45 injured when a heavily overloaded bus plunged into a gorge in northern India.

It was one of the worst road accidents in the country in recent years.

The bus, which was carrying over 100 passengers – many of them on the roof – veered off the road in a sparsely populated and hilly area of the state of Himachal Pradesh.

“Fifty-two people have been killed and 45 injured in the accident,”said Sunil Chaudhary, district deputy commissioner, adding the death toll could rise because at least a dozen of the injured were in a critical condition.

There were anguished scenes as families came to claim the bodies of the victims. Many of the dead had boarded the 42-seater bus when their own bus broke down, locals said.

Some of the bodies were taken away by their families for cremation while the state government brought in four truckloads of wood to cremate other victims at the accident site.

The cause was not immediately known but some witnesses said that the driver lost control of the vehicle on a sharp bend.

The accident occurred in the morning near Chamba town, about 190 kilometres from the state capital Shimla. The area where the accident happened is treacherous and known for zig-zag turns.

Villagers were the first to reach the accident site and frantically struggled to pull the dead and injured from the twisted wreckage. Later, emergency crews arrived, covering the dead in white sheets.

The bus had been on its way to Chamba from Dulera when it flew off the road. Thirty-nine people were killed instantly while the others died on the way to hospital, Mr Chaudhary said.

It was the second major bus tragedy in a week, in a country where road accidents with dozens dead at a time are common.

On Wednesday, 31 people were killed when their bus tumbled into a gorge in Meghalaya state, in India’s remote northeast.

In 2008, some 63 bus passengers returning from a religious celebration were killed when a burst tyre ignited the vehicle’s fuel tank east of the Taj Mahal city of Agra.

India has the highest annual road death toll in the world, according to a 2009 World Health Organisation report, with accidents caused by speeding, careless driving and treacherous roads.

Himachal Pradesh’s Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal offered his “heartfelt condolences to the families of the dead” and said the next of kin would get 100,000 rupees ($1700) from the government.

“The state government has ordered an inquiry into the accident,” Mr Dhumal said.

The Chamba district borders Indian Kashmir and has been lashed by heavy monsoon rains in the past few days.

Another report said hundreds of people were stranded by a rain-triggered flood in central China’s Hubei Province. Heavy rains hit Gucheng county in the city of Xiangyang early Monday morning, flooding the downtown area and surrounding villages, county fire fighters said.

Over 100 people were trapped in village called Tiejia in southwest China’s Yunnan Province this morning, local authorities said. Although more than 200 people were initially trapped in the mudslide in the county of Eyuan, Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture, more than 80 people had been saved by noon.

Radiation / Nuclear

TVA says an unusual event at the Watts Bar nuclear plant forced its evacuation this morning. Spokesman Mike Bradley says an ammonia-water leak developed in a secondary water system at the turbine building at the plant. That happened just before 9:00am. Between two and three hundred employees were evacuated as a result. The leak was fixed and the event was declared over just before 1:30pm this afternoon. Bradley says the leak did not disrupt the reactor. There were no injuries and there was no risk to the general public.

An Indonesian man has died of bird flu, the health ministry said Saturday, in the country’s ninth fatal case this year. Ads by Google Colorectal Cancer – Learn about leading-edge treatments for Colorectal Cancer today. – cancercenter.com “The deceased was a self-employed 37-year-old male,” according to the report on the ministry’s website. The man was hospitalised on July 24 with a high fever and was placed on a ventilator five days later, according to the report. He died on July 30. Authorities do not know how the man contracted the virus, but said he lived near poultry farms. Indonesia has been hardest-hit by bird flu, with 159 fatalities reported since 2003 out of 359 worldwide, according to World Health Organization figures, which include the latest death. Bird flu, also known as the H5N1 virus, typically spreads from birds to humans through direct contact, but experts fear it could mutate into a form that is easily transmissible between humans.

The explosion hurled a faint cloud of plasma into space. Judging from the blast site’s off-center location on the solar disk, the cloud is probably not heading for Earth. This conclusion is uncertain, however. Stay tuned for additional analysis. Solar Flare alerts

Solar storms can disrupt communication, and navigational equipment, damage satellites, and even cause blackouts by damaging power plants and electrical grid components.

They can also bring additional radiation around the north and south poles; and this, in turn forces airlines to reroute their flights.

According to a report published by NERC, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, or NERC, which oversees North America’s power grid we can feel the effects for several years to come.

“Historically large storms have a potential to cause power grid blackouts and transformer damage of unprecedented proportions, long-term blackouts and lengthy restoration times, and chronic shortages for multiple years are possible,” the report said.

Click on image to enlargeTerrible stripe on the Sun
This filament happened on Aug. 5th, 2012.
11 images were put together to create this huge filamament on the Sun.
Photo Credits: Leonard E. Mercer,
amateur astronomer from Malta, who contributes with many astrophotos. Richard Andres, an energy and environmental security expert at the military’s National Defense University (NDU), is helping to coordinate an interagency group to deal with the problem. The failure of the national power grid could be disastrous, he said.

In a worst-case scenario, commerce would almost instantly cease, he said, noting he was speaking for himself and not the U.S. government. Water and fuel, which depend on electric pumps, would stop flowing in most cities within hours, modern communications would end and mechanized transport would stall.

Backup generators for hospitals, the military, and other critical facilities would be vulnerable if they depended on diesel or natural gas, which also rely on pipelines for resupply.

The report said more than 130 million people in the United States could be affected. Andres said the death toll could run into the millions in the worst-case scenario.

How many people will suffer world-wide? We can only make guesses about the number of deaths.

There are leaks in Earth’s magnetic field. Earth’s magnetic field which acts as our protective shield in space has a hole in it. That could be a problem because a weakened field could leave Earth vulnerable to solar storms.

Unfortunately it is impossible to determine in advance in how serious danger Earth will be.

Image credit: SPL“It’s a lot like asking how many trees would fall in the next hurricane,” a government expert said. “We don’t know that, but we do know that there will be a hurricane. When we have another space weather superstorm, there will be an effect on the grid. We’re trying to understand now what that effect is going to be.”

Earth is passing through a stream of debris from Comet Swift-Tuttle, source of the annual Perseid meteor shower. Worldwide observers are now reporting more than 90 Perseids per hour. Forecasters recommend looking during the dark hours before dawn, especially Sunday morning, August 12th, when activity is expected to be highest.

Got clouds? Tune into SpaceWeather Radio for live echoes from Perseid meteors flying over the US Space Surveillance Radar in Texas.

The multi-station Canadian Meteor Orbit Radar, sponsored by NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office, is also monitoring the Perseids. Live data are available here. Bright spots in this sample radar sky map show the radiants of currently active showers:

Clearly, the Perseids are not the only meteors in the sky this weekend. The Northern and Southern Delta Aquarids (NDA and SDA) are also active. These showers, which are minor compared to the Perseids, spring from 96P/Machholz, a comet that some researchers suspect is a visitor from another star system.

This is a great weekend for watching meteors–but that’s not all. Venus, Jupiter and the crescent Moon are lining up in the pre-dawn sky right in the middle of the Perseid display. The conjunction of planets guarantees that you will see something beautiful even in the unlikely event that the shower fizzles

“These phenomena are not unknown for While Island, but this is the first substantial confirmation that small scale eruptions are now occurring on the island and confirms the risk to visitors has increased,” he said.

“Eruptions can occur at any time with little or no warning. We advise extra caution should be taken, if visiting the island.”

GNS has changed the volcano’s code from “experiencing signs of elevated unrest above known background levels” to “volcanic eruption is underway with no or minor ash emissions”.

The alert level has also changed from one to two due to “minor eruptive activity”.

It follows a code change last week when scientists discovered water levels in Crater Lake rose by about 3m to 5m overnight and the number of tremors had increased.

There was a particularly stronger seismic episode recorded Sunday morning, ending in a volcanic earthquake at 4.54am that day.

Rosenberg said: “[The earthquake] had a sound signal, which meant something happened on the surface. So we went back and looked at the camera images.”

“Obviously being at night time, there was no visual observations and initially we weren’t able to determine what that small event was.

“But we’ve narrowed it down and recognise that there has been full hydrothermal eruption.”

Rosenberg said there had not been any further eruptions, and the number of tremors had decreased.

“It’s now at similar levels to before the weekend.”

GNS Science was “paying close attention” to the volcano as the last “gentle eruption” had been in early 2001.

White Island also experienced a “moderate-sized explosion” in July 2000, when fresh lava was pushed out.

“In the past this kind of activity has increased to small eruptions that produce ash, and that ash could drift as far as the mainland,” Rosenberg said.

“We can’t predict what the volcano is going to do and we are not making any forecasts, but yes, it’s certainly possible that the activity could ramp up again.”

A mountain which the Icelandic Marine Research Institute (Hafró) discovered on the ocean floor west off the Snæfellsnes peninsula in West Iceland during an expedition earlier this summer may turn out to be a previously unknown volcano.

A fishing ship with Snæfellsjökull, the glacier-covered volcano on the tip of Snæfellsnes in the background. Copyright: Icelandic Photo Agency.

“Multi-laser measurements […] revealed a large underwater mountain deep off the foot of the continental shelf approximately 120 nautical miles west of Snæfellsnes,” a statement from Hafró reads, according to Fréttablaðið.

The mountain, which is at a depth of 950 to 1,400 meters is around 450 meters high, similar to Ingólfsfjall in south Iceland. However, it extends over 300 square kilometers, which is ten times the square measure of Ingólfsfjall.

The shape of the mountain is very similar to that of table mountains and it appears to be geologically young.

“The analysis of a rock sample from the mountain will determine whether this is the case or whether it is a volcano connected with an old drift belt, which might mean that it is 20 million years old,” the statement continues.

During the expedition multi-laser measurements were made between West Iceland and Greenland to map the shape of the ocean floor in these commonly-used fishing grounds and explore the environment of powerful ocean currents.

A total of 9,000 square kilometers were covered during the 11-day expedition.

GNS duty volcanologist Michael Rosenberg told Radio New Zealand that some people are reported to have left their houses on the southern shores of Lake Rotoaira, though no formal notices of evacuation have been issued so far by Civil Defence.

He said residents in the area have told GNS of hearing several loud explosions, lightning and plumes of smoke and police have been told by an onlooker that “a new hole in the side of the mountain” had formed.

They have also reported bright red rocks flying out of the mountain.

The eruption reportedly happened at the Te Mari Craters, which are close to the Ketetahi Hot Springs on the northern side of the mountain.

There have been no further eruptions since midnight, according to GNS seismic records.

Mr Rosenberg said while volcanologists have been monitoring small earthquakes under the mountain in the past few weeks, the eruption was “quite unexpected”.

Activity at the mountain is expected continue for some time, bit it was “anyone’s guess” whether there would be larger eruptions.

“The advice to people is to stay indoors, because volcanic ash can obviously be a health hazard, if they’re indoors please close windows and doors to try and limit the entry of ash.”

Mr Cholewa says at this stage not all areas alerted are affected by ash, but that situation could change.

“We’re working actively with GNS Science who operate the monitoring equipment on the mountains, and with police so all the information from the ground is being gathered, and decisions will be based on that information.

“Evacuations have not been ordered, please listen to the radio for advice from local authorities and police, any evacuations would be issued at that level, and based on the evidence from GNS Science.”

Police are sending search and rescue teams up Mt Tongariro at first light to check no one is stranded in huts. However, they say there have been no reports of injuries or damage.

ROADS

The police have closed State Highway 1 between Rangipo and Waiouru (Desert Road) and SH46 west of Rangipo. SH47 and 4 remain open at this stage as does SH5.

Motorists are being advised to avoid travel in the area and these closures will be re-assessed once daylight reveals the extent of the ash cloud.

Truck driver Bryn Rodda told Radio New Zealand thick dust meant there was poor visibility on the Desert Road when he passed through last night.

“I could see this big cloud – it looked like a fist, basically, at an angle across the sky – and about the wrist section of the fist there was an orange ball of flash that I saw.”
Clayton Bolt, a passing motorist told RadioLive that he saw a massive white cloud coming from the side of Mt Tongariro.

“I put my foot down. I said, I’m going.”

AVIATION

Civil Aviation Authority manager of meteorology Peter Lechner said the plume is leading off to the east and south east. affecting a zone of airspace stretching as far as from Tongariro to north of Gisborne then south to Hawkes Bay and possibly northern Wairarapa.

The CAA alerted all aircraft using a volcanic ash advisory system, working with MetService.

Mr Lechner said that ash can build up in the turbines of aeroplanes and helicopters, causing engines to stall.

“It can result in significant flight risk.”

WEATHER

WeatherWatch chief analyst Philip Duncan said westerlies will continue to blow the ash east to south east of the mountain.

“The winds don’t look especially strong over the next few days as the centre of a low crosses the North Island – the lighter the winds are the more ash will fall locally around the mountain and less likely to cause widespread disruptions further afield.”

The Ministry of Civil Defence & Emergency Management (MCDEM) is currently assessing information with the assistance of GNS scientific advisors.

It has not yet activated the National Crisis Management Centre which is called upon in times of emergency like the Christchurch earthquake.

The volcanic alert level for Mt Tongariro has risen from 1 to 2 after the central North Island volcano erupted for the first time in more than a century late last night. GNS science is reporting that at approximately 11:50pm on Monday night ash fall began to be reported in the volcano’s vicinity – it has since been reported as far east as SH5 near Te Haroto and in Napier. GNS duty volcanologist Michael Rosenberg told Radio New Zealand that some people are reported to have left their houses on the southern shores of Lake Rotoaira, though no formal notices of evacuation have been issued so far by Civil Defense. He said residents in the area have told GNS of hearing several loud explosions, lightning and plumes of smoke and police have been told by an onlooker that “a new hole in the side of the mountain” had formed. They have also reported bright red rocks flying out of the mountain. The eruption reportedly happened at the Te Mari Craters, which are close to the Ketetahi Hot Springs on the northern side of the mountain. Civil defence spokesman Vince Cholewa told NewstalkZb ash could reach those living in Waikato, Hawke’s Bay, Gisborne, Manawatu-Wanganui, Bay of Plenty and Taranaki. “The advice to people is to stay indoors, because volcanic ash can obviously be a health hazard, if they’re indoors please close windows and doors to try and limit the entry of ash.” Mr Cholewa says at this stage not all areas alerted are affected by ash, but that situation could change. “We’re working actively with GNS Science who operate the monitoring equipment on the mountains, and with police so all the information from the ground is being gathered, and decisions will be based on that information. “Evacuations have not been ordered, please listen to the radio for advice from local authorities and police, any evacuations would be issued at that level, and based on the evidence from GNS Science.”

Due to possible danger to the public the police have closed SH1 between Rangipo and Waiouru (Desert Road) and SH46 west of Rangipo. SH47 and 4 remain open at this stage as does SH5. Motorists are being advised to avoid travel in the area and these closures will be re-assessed once daylight reveals the extent of the ash cloud. A truck driver has told Radio New Zealand that the ash cloud has caused thick dust and reduced visibility on the Desert Road. Bryn Rodda said he saw a large cloud rising from the mountain with orange flashes. Civil Aviation Authority manager of meteorology Peter Lechner told NewstalkZb the plume is leading off to the east and south east. “Flight operations to the west of the plume should remain unaffected, however operations to the eastern half of the North Island will have some difficulty at this stage.” Mr Lechner says a frontal system is on its way which should disperse the cloud, but that depends on whether there are further eruptions. Police are sending search and rescue teams up Mt Tongariro at first light to check no one is stranded in huts. However, they say there have been no reports of injuries or damage. The Ministry of Civil Defence & Emergency Management (MCDEM) is currently assessing information with the assistance of GNS scientific advisors. It has not yet activated the National Crisis Management Centre which is called upon in times of emergency like the Christchurch earthquake. New Zealand’s other high profile active volcano, White Island, also had its alert level raised from 1 to 2 on Monday after a small eruption was recorded in its crater lake.

Historically high temperatures were recorded in 28 locations throughout Bulgaria on Monday, the country’s National Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology (NIMH) said. At 3 p.m. local time (0200 GMT), the temperature in Ruse by the Danube River was 41 degrees Celsius. Pleven in northern Bulgaria recorded 40 degrees Celsius, followed by Sandanski in the southwest of the country at 39.6 degrees Celsius. Meanwhile, temperatures in the capital Sofia also hit 34.6 degrees Celsius. Temperatures were unusually high even in the mountains, NIMH said. At Botev peak, temperatures reached 17.5 degrees Celsius, 25.2 degrees Celsius at Murgash peak, and 26.5 degrees Celsius at Rozhen peak. Record-high temperatures were reported also on the Black Sea coast in the towns of Ahtopol and Varna at 35 degree Celsius, and cape of Kaliakra at 32.8 degree Celsius. Temperatures will remain high on Tuesday, after which they should return to what is considered normal for the season, NIMH said.

NASCAR fans at Pocono Raceway were advised over public address systems and through social media to take cover when lightning and heavy rain hit the track near the end of the race. The warnings weren’t enough to avoid tragedy at the track on Sunday. Lightning strikes at Pocono after a rain-shortened NASCAR race killed one fan and injured nine others, one critically, racetrack officials said. Multiple lightning strikes occurred behind the racetrack’s grandstands and outside one of the gates as fans were leaving, Pocono spokesman Bob Pleban said. It wasn’t immediately clear how many of the fans were actually struck by the lightning itself or were injured by related jolts. “Unfortunately, a member of our raceway family here, a fan, has passed away,” Pocono President Brandon Igdalsky said in announcing the death. He provided no details about the victim but expressed condolences to his family. Igdalsky later posted on Twitter, “My family and I are praying for all those that were involved in the lightning strikes. … Difficult evening for all.” The victim was in or near his car in a parking lot after the race had ended when lightning struck the car, Monroe County Coroner Bob Allen said. Bystanders performed CPR on the man, who had gone into cardiac arrest, until paramedics arrived, Allen said. They took him to the track’s medical facility, where efforts to revive him failed. He was pronounced dead at a hospital.

The Pennsylvania 400 was called because of storms, with 98 of the 160 scheduled laps completed. As the storm approached, the track posted messages on its Twitter page to more than 22,000 followers near the end of the race encouraging fans to “seek shelter as severe lightning and heavy winds are in our area.” The attendance was estimated by the track at 85,000. Public address announcements were made before the storm and the end of the race for fans to take shelter and evacuate the grandstands, Pleban said. Racetrack officials were reviewing the logs of when the announcements were made, he said. There was no order to evacuate the track premises. Jeff Gordon, who won the race, said at a post-race news conference that he could hear a huge crack as he walked down the pit road during the storm. “You could tell it was very close,” he said. “I mean, that’s the thing that’s going to take away from the victory, is the fact that somebody was affected by that.” Kyle Manger, a spectator from New Jersey, told The Sporting News that he saw people hit by lightning near the Turn 3 grandstands. He said when the severe weather began, he and some friends ran to their truck. “The visibility was very poor and all of a sudden (I) saw a bolt of lightning right in front of our windshield,” he said. “When it became a little more visible, we saw two bodies next to a destroyed tent with people scrambling.” One person remained hospitalized in critical condition at Lehigh Valley Hospital Center, Pleban said. Three people were taken to hospitals with minor to moderate injuries, and five others were treated on the scene, he said. “We are deeply saddened that a fan has died and others were injured by lightning strikes following today’s race at Pocono,” NASCAR spokesman David Higdon said. “Our thoughts are with them as well as those affected by this unfortunate accident.” Gordon’s team, Hendrick Motorsports, also offered sympathies on Twitter, writing, “Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone affected by the lightning” at Pocono Raceway.

Around 900 holidaymakers from Italy and abroad were moved from hotels and camping areas as the fire hit the Zingaro National Park on the island’s northwest tip overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea. “The Zingaro reserve went up in flames,” said Matteo Rizzo, Mayor of San Vito Lo Capo, just north of the park. Firefighters, forest patrols and volunteers worked for 12 hours to bring the fire under control and a school was opened in San Vito Lo Capo to house evacuees while others slept outdoors in the stifling heat. Mr Rizzo said the damage from the Zingaro blaze could have been reduced if firefighters had received air support. “I realise that there were a number of fires in Sicily and the situation was rather serious, but it is inconceivable that one of the most beautiful and oldest reserves in Sicily went up in smoke because no one lifted a finger.” Park officials said on Monday the reserve would remain closed to the public while they assessed the full extent of the park’s vegetation and wildlife which includes 40 different birds, rabbits, snakes and weasels. The reserve covers 4,000 acres and beneath its dramatic cliffs there are coves and grottoes stretching for four miles of the coast. One hotel owner said electricity and water supplies had been cut off and telephone lines were down while emergency workers continued to secure the area as temperatures soared close to 95F (35C).

A wildfire that has burned about 1,000 acres of grass and brush near Chelan also threatens 14 homes or outbuildings. Chelan County sheriff’s Cpl. Jason Reinfeld told The Wenatchee World the owners were advised of the danger. The fire broke out about noon Sunday off Highway 97. State, federal and Chelan County crews are attacking the fire from the ground and air using two air tankers and three helicopters, which are dipping from the Columbia River.

Manila, Aug 6 (Prensa Latina) More than 45 people died and six others missing due to Typhoon Saola in the northern region of Philippines, reported on Monday the National Center for Disaster Prevention.

The rains and flooding caused further serious damage to 74 roads, 7, 000 homes and the evacuation of about 200, 000 people still housed in improvised centers, according to the press.

Landslides and overflowing dam flooded much of Manila, the capital, especially in the areas near the sea, other media reported as Rappler website.

Between May and November, during rainy season in the Philippines, the archipelago is hit by an average of 15 to 20 typhoons that affect the entire region of Southeast Asia.

Hundreds of people residing near Beas river have been evacuated to safe places after flash flood caused by torrential rain over Dhundi peaks at south portal of Rohtang tunnel flooded the Seri rivulet, a tributary to Beas river, on Friday at 8pm. People living close to river between Palchan and Kullu are being evacuated and traffic on national highway has been stopped. Till last report received from Palchan (near Dhundi) at 10.30pm, level of the river was rising continuously and police were evacuating the people from Bahang village, 6km from Manali. According to police, there is no report of any casualty. Sandeep Kumar, a resident of Bahang village, said people are trying to save the household accessories amid chaotic atmosphere and conditions have become even worse after power failure. “Everything was normal till late evening but the situation changed suddenly after 8pm when river water, mixed with sludge, started engulfing its banks. People are risking their lives to remove the household stuffs,” he said. An engineer working with a hydel project near Palchan said over phone that roaring sound of river is shaking the foundation of the houses. “Nobody is going to sleep tonight. Villagers have gathered at many places and are guarding the river banks with floodlights,” he said. According to villagers it is a cloudburst which might have caused devastation at its source on mountains. Kullu deputy commissioner Amitabh Awasthi said , police are patrolling the river banks and have directed people to move to safe places. “We have closed the traffic on national highway. We shall keep an eye on the situation throughout the night,” he said.

Torrential rains pounding the Philippine capital on Tuesday paralyzed traffic as waist-deep floods triggered evacuations of tens of thousands of residents and the government suspended work in offices and schools. Incessant downpours set off by the seasonal monsoon overflowed major dams and rivers in Manila and nine surrounding provinces and put authorities on alert. The death toll from last week’s Typhoon Saola, which battered Manila and the northern Philippines for several days, has climbed steadily to 51. The head of the government’s rescue agency, Benito Ramos, said there were no immediate reports of new casualties early Tuesday after the rains pounded already saturated Manila for more than 24 hours. Vehicles and even heavy trucks struggled to navigate water-clogged roads, where hundreds of thousands of commuters were stranded overnight. Many cars were stuck in the muddy waters. The La Mesa dam, which supplies water to the capital of 12 million people, spilled excess water for a second time early Tuesday into the rivers flowing into Quezon city, a middle-class Manila suburb, as well as the neighborhoods of Malabon, Valenzuela and Caloocan, where several villages were submerged. Along the swollen Marikina River, police were deployed to move more than 5,000 residents away from the riverbanks in what Vice Mayor Jose Cadiz said was an enforced evacuation. The operation started after the City Hall sounded the alarm bell. The Philippine Stock Exchange in the financial district of Makati, which was also flooded, was closed Tuesday. Also closed was the U.S. Embassy along Manila Bay in the historic old city, which was drenched out last week when a storm surge pushed the water over the seawall. “The embassy is closed today due to excessive flooding in the streets and concern for the safety of our employees and consular applicants,” Ambassador Harry Thomas Jr. said in an announcement.

Heavy rains pounded northeast Tennessee Sunday, including downtown Johnson City, where emergency crews in inflatable boats rescued people trapped in their homes and in their cars on flooded streets. Johnson City Schools announced their start on Monday is postponed because of the storm damage. The city’s garage complex flooded and several were buses under water, leading the city to cancel transit service for Monday. WTFM radio reported shelters were still open at schools in Unicoi and Jonesborough early Monday. Streams throughout the region overflowed across roads and into homes. Houses and apartments in several areas are surrounded by water at the Mall at Johnson City’s parking lot was covered by high water, stranding numerous vehicles. Sections of Washington, Carter and Unicoi counties also were flooded. The National Weather Service said three to four inches of rain fell within an hour’s time across upper northeast Tennessee during the height of the storm. And more rain was expected through the night. At least 10 people were rescued from their homes in Washington County, and in Unicoi County, officers and volunteer firefighters were evacuating other areas as well. In down downtown Johnson City, a portion of one street washed away into a creek, officials said. “Occasionally, we’ve been up to our gun belt in water, but it’s starting to subside,” said city police Lt. Gerald Harrell. “We are actively answering every call for service that we have. It may be taking us just a tad bit longer, but we’re getting to each and every one and we will get to each and every one,” Harrell said.Police urged people to stay home and avoid any local travel if possible and emergency shelters were open. Elizabethton also was hit hard, officials there said. “We’ve got flooding all over,” Carter County Sheriff Chris Mathes said. Unicoi County Sheriff Mike Hensley said when he first was called at 7 p.m. or so, it was just drizzling. “When I came in, it was just unreal. The water was coming up and I saw we were going to have serious, serious problems,” he said. About 4,000 customers, most in Johnson City, had no power but officials expected it to be restored quickly.

Epidemic Hazards / Diseases

A team of medical experts from Dar es Salaam was yesterday dispatched to Kagera region to further examine the two patients believed to be suffering from the Ebola hemorrhagic fever. But as the team of medical experts was sent to Kagera region, the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare subsequently confirmed the outbreak of the deadly fever in the western part of the country. Confirming the reports, the Deputy Minister for Health and Social Welfare, Dr Seif Seleman Rashid, also said that a team of medical experts was still diagnosing a patient in efforts to establish the symptoms. In the meantime, reports from Nyakahanga designated hospital in Karagwe district, Kagera region indicate that there were two patients including a child, suspected to be suffering from the deadly fever that has rocked neighbouring Uganda. According to one of the doctors who diagnosed the patient at Karagwe’s Nyakahanga hospital, preliminary findings show that the victim might have contacted the Ebola virus. However, the doctor who requested anonymity told the Guardian on Sunday that ‘further medical examination’ would be conducted to gather more evidence about the possible outbreak of Ebola, adding that the patient had since been quarantined pending final results. According to the doctor, the ‘Ebola patient’ was brought to the hospital on Friday morning and, upon diagnosis, it was established that the patient had suffered from Ebola. The patient who is a six-year-old child was brought to the Mulongo hospital by his mother from a village close to the Uganda-Tanzania boarder after the child developed severe symptoms.

“We are doing further medical examination on a patient … we will tell the general public once it is confirmed that we are dealing with Ebola virus infections,” the doctor said, adding that currently the patient alleged to have been infected was admitted in a separate room and now lives in isolation from other patients at the hospital. He said preliminary check-ups found out that the diagnosis had all signs showed clear symptoms of Ebola – after which he ordered the patient to be admitted for closer monitoring locally, and further medical examination by medical experts from the ministry headquarters. He added that the patient had since been placed in a special intensive care room which is out of bounds for all other people — apart from his mother who is taking care of the patient. However, he said, this was a medical rule aimed at avoiding quick spread of the deadly disease Another patient also believed to have crossed the boarder from Uganda was admitted at the hospital as well, but medical investigations of his deteriorating health conditions were still not completed by Saturday evening. As a precaution, the doctor said his hospital team and the district health workers had since started warning people in surrounding villages to take immediate measures whenever they come across such patients. He has also warned the people living closer to the border with Uganda to be careful not to come into contact with any person whom they see vomiting or bleeding – clear signs of someone suffering from Ebola.

On Wednesday this week, Dr. Mwinyi told visibly alarmed legislators in Dodoma that a team of medical experts had been dispatched to the border with Uganda, fully equipped with protective gear and medical supplies. The minister advised the general public especially those living in the northern regions of Kagera, Mara, Mwanza and Kigoma — some of which share the border crossings with Uganda — to take precautions because the disease was highly contagious. Earlier, the World Health Organization (WHO) had alerted Tanzania on the Ebola threat, prompting the ministry to issue a press statement elaborating that Ebola (Ebola HF) was a severe, often-fatal disease in humans and nonhuman primates (monkeys, gorillas, and chimpanzees) that has appeared sporadically since its initial recognition in 1976. The disease is caused by infection with Ebola virus, named after a river in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Zaire), where it was first recognized. The virus is one of two members of a family of RNA viruses called the Filoviridae; there are five identified subtypes of the Ebola virus — four of which have been known to cause disease in humans: Ebola-Zaire, Ebola-Sudan, Ebola-Ivory Coast and Ebola-Bundibugyo. The fifth, Ebola-Reston, has caused disease in nonhuman primates, but not in humans.

Biohazard name:

Ebola (susp.)

Biohazard level:

4/4 Hazardous

Biohazard desc.:

Viruses and bacteria that cause severe to fatal disease in humans, and for which vaccines or other treatments are not available, such as Bolivian and Argentine hemorrhagic fevers, H5N1(bird flu), Dengue hemorrhagic fever, Marburg virus, Ebola virus, hantaviruses, Lassa fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, and other hemorrhagic or unidentified diseases. When dealing with biological hazards at this level the use of a Hazmat suit and a self-contained oxygen supply is mandatory. The entrance and exit of a Level Four biolab will contain multiple showers, a vacuum room, an ultraviolet light room, autonomous detection system, and other safety precautions designed to destroy all traces of the biohazard. Multiple airlocks are employed and are electronically secured to prevent both doors opening at the same time. All air and water service going to and coming from a Biosafety Level 4 (P4) lab will undergo similar decontamination procedures to eliminate the possibility of an accidental release.

At least 10 people admitted to the Sukraraj Tropical and Disease Control Hospital in Nepali capital Kathmandu have tested positive for cholera. The hospital laboratory said Vibrio Cholera belonging to 01 Ogawa stereotype was detected in all the patients. Doctors at hospital attributed the spread of cholera and diarrhea infection in Kathmandu to contaminated water, according to Saturday’s Republica daily. “Most of the patients who came to the hospital said that they had drunk water supplied by Kathmandu Upatyaka Kahanepani Limited without boiling or treatment,” Tulsha Adhikari, a nursing staff said. She said whole families had been infected and some were brought to the hospital by their neighbors as all family members were sick.

Biohazard name:

Cholera

Biohazard level:

2/4 Medium

Biohazard desc.:

Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.

Biological Hazards / Wildlife / Hazmat

Low levels of a deadly nerve agent have been detected in a chemical weapons igloo containing M55 GB, or sarin, rockets at Blue Grass Army Depot in central Kentucky. The Army Chemical Materials Agency says there’s no danger to people in Madison or surrounding counties and that state and local emergency officials have been notified of the leak. Toxic chemical workers have connected a 1,000 cubic feet-per-minute filter to the igloo’s rear vent. The agency says the leak was discovered during weekly monitoring.

Articles of Interest

South Korea’s state power company issued a shortage warning on Monday, meaning that reserves are dangerously low, as electricity consumption rose sharply due to an unusual heatwave. The warning from the Korea Electric Power Company (KEPCO) was aimed at averting power cuts, the knowledge economy ministry said, urging households, factories and other users to cut consumption voluntarily. Temperatures have stayed above 35 degrees Celsius (95 F) for 10 consecutive days across the country, driving up air-conditioning use. It was the first such warning since last September, when more than 2.1 million households and other premises were hit with rolling power cuts lasting up to one hour. The ministry also resumed operations of the country’s oldest nuclear power plant at Gori. It had been closed for months due to scrutiny over its safety and protests by civic groups. “We are relieved to resume operations of the Gori reactor at a time when power consumption is expected to reach its peak,” Knowledge Economy Minister Hong Suk-Woo said in a statement. In February the Gori plant, built in 1978 near the southern city of Busan, briefly lost mains power and the emergency generator failed to kick in. The incident did not result in any radioactive leaks but it sparked an extensive probe amid concerns over nuclear safety following last year’s atomic crisis in Japan. South Korea operates 23 nuclear power plants which meet more than 35 percent of its electricity needs. Analysts say successive governments have failed to authorise major increases in the relatively low cost of electricity, encouraging wasteful consumption. KEPCO last Friday decided to raise rates by 4.9 percent, yielding to government pressure to limit the increase to less than five percent.

Several storms caused major damage around the Tennessee Valley Sunday. The Claysville Snack Bar in Guntersville bar was completely blown away by the storm. In Limestone county, a huge tree landed on top of an RV in Coxey. It’s unknown if anyone was inside. Extreme heat from the Midwest to eastern parts of the U.S. helped fuel severe thunderstorms that knocked out power to millions over the weekend. Crews are still working to restore electricity to the millions who are without power as they try to cope with the heat. A grocery store chain helped in parts of Virginia and Maryland Sunday by giving away 10-pound bags of ice to those in need. “People have been clearing debris from roads together so we like the sense of community, but we would like our power back just because it is so hot and we’d like to get back to normal if we possibly can,” said one storm victim. So far, 16 people have died and four governors have declared a state of emergency.

Weekend electrical storms killed four people, injured at least 100 others, caused power outages and disrupted train service across Germany, officials said. Officials said a woman was killed in Bavaria Saturday when a tree fell on her car while three women golfers were killed by a lightning strike Friday in Hessen. Many of the people who were wounded sustained their injuries while outdoors, reported on Sunday. At least 51 festival-goers were hurt, nine seriously, when lightning struck a mast at the “With Full Force” heavy metal outdoor festival in Saxony. A festival in Baden-Wurttemberg was cut short Sunday after wind tossed tents and debris, injuring at least 10 attendees. Eighteen others were injured at a Volksfest in Bavaria when wind-blown tree branches were hurled into the crowd, officials said. The German weather service said 8,135 lightning strikes were recorded in the Berlin area alone.

Violent storms in the DC area have killed at least 13 people, uprooted thousands of trees and left over 1.3 million homes and businesses without power across the Mid-Atlantic during a powerful heat wave. Popular Internet services went down too.

States of emergency were declared in Maryland, Virginia, Washington DC, Ohio, and West Virginia on Saturday after storm winds hit almost 130 kilometers per hour and caused a series of fatalities, while reports from power companies have warned it may take up to a week to restore electricity. Officials are extremely concerned about the outage occurring in the middle of a record heat wave. The area affected by the storms was far ranging, including New Jersey and Indiana. However, the most extensive damage occurred in West Virginia, Virginia, Maryland, and Washington DC.

At least four people were killed by falling trees, reports the Washington Post, citing local police officials. Two of the fatalities occurred in the Springfield area of Virginia’s Fairfax County. A male driver was killed at Old Keene Mill Road and Bauer Drive when a tree struck his car. A 90-year-old woman was killed in her bed when a tree fell on her house.

A falling tree has also killed a 71-year-old woman in her bed in Silver Spring in Maryland’s Montgomery County. And a 25-year-old Edgewater man died when a tree fell on his car as he drove on Harwood Road in Anne Arundel County.

One person died in Washington, DC, after accidentally touching a live electrical wire. Following the incident the Pepco electric service provider issued a warning urging people to be cautious around the numerous downed power lines.

Two more deaths have been reported in Albemarle county and two others in Bedford county, both in the state of Virginia. One person is reported missing after a boat capsized Friday night off Chesapeake Beach in Calvert County, Maryland. Four others have been rescued.

Virginia Governor Robert McDonnell said Friday night’s storm had triggered the largest non-hurricane power outage in state history. It has also forced the closure of 250 roads because of fallen trees.

“This is a very dangerous situation for Virginia,” McDonnell said. “Recovery will be difficult… It’s going to be days before power is fully restored in the commonwealth.”

President Barack Obama has called McDonnell and Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, as well as the governors of Ohio and West Virginia, to offer the federal government’s help.

Hurricane-like storms have also knocked out an Amazon data center in Ashburn, Virginia. A number of popular Internet services, including Netflix, Pinterest, Heroku and Instagram have been cut off for several hours, something that did not go unnoticed by their users worldwide.

“Severe thunderstorms caused us to lose primary and backup generator power to an Availability Zone in our east region overnight,”

an Amazon spokeswoman Tera Randall said on Saturday.

“We have restored service to most of our impacted customers and continue to work to restore service for our remaining impacted customers.”

Meanwhile, temperatures have been breaking the 100°F-mark (38°C) for two days in a row, and are not expected to be any lower on Sunday. Local authorities have open libraries, swimming pools and cooling centers to provide residents with respite from the heat.

Malls around the region are jammed with people buying power outlets for their phones and computers. Long lines are also reported at gas stations where power is still available.

More storms are expected later on Saturday, though they are unlikely to be as widespread or powerful as Friday’s.

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Local resident Betty Coll (L) shows friend Joe Straub (R) damages in front of her house after a powerful overnight storm in the Washington, DC region June 30, 2012 in Falls Church, Virginia (Alex Wong/Getty Images/AFP)“>
Local resident Betty Coll (L) shows friend Joe Straub (R) damages in front of her house after a powerful overnight storm in the Washington, DC region June 30, 2012 in Falls Church, Virginia (Alex Wong/Getty Images/AFP)“>
Debris from the storm-damaged Park Tanglewood apartments, some of which were exposed when high winds tore open a hole in the roof and knocked out the electricity, sits atop cars and utility lines in the parking lot in Riverdale, Maryland, June 30, 2012 (Reuters/Jonathan Ernst)“>“>
People react upon seeing storm damage in the Capitol Hill neighborhood in Washington, June 30, 2012 (Reuters/Jonathan Ernst)

Crews battled a wildfire near Townsend. Officials said it charred about 450 acres as of Sunday evening. The blaze was reported at about 3:15. Broadwater County crews have enlisted the assistance of the state Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Forest Service, according to Sheriff Brenda Ludwig. The fire is off of Indian Creek Road and was actively burning in Bureau of Land Management and Montana National Guard lands. It has entered the Limestone Hills Range. No structures were threatened as of Sunday evening. Indian Creek Road and Old Woman’s Grave Road were closed to help fire crews. Even though the roadways have been reopened, Ludwig urged nonresidents to stay out of the area. Broadwater County Fire Chief Ed Shindoll said the cause of the blaze is under investigation. His department has about 25 firefighters, Forest Service has a crew of 17 on the blaze and the DNRC has nine personnel. A DNRC helicopter was being used Sunday afternoon but had to leave due to high winds, Shindoll said. A storm was making its way through the area at about 6 p.m. “It just started sprinkling here,” Ludwig said. Broadwater County, as well as Lewis and Clark and Jefferson counties, were under a severe thunderstorm watch until late Sunday night. “We have to watch and see what the storm brings,” Shindoll said. “Winds have been pretty steady at probably 30 miles per an hour plus and they haven’t died down yet.” Ludwig said the fire area got a small amount of moisture.”Every little bit helps,” she added. Crews will be on the fire throughout the night.

Today

Forest / Wild Fire

USA

State of Arizona, [Safford Ranger District of the Coronado National Forest]

Firefighters continue to battle the 8,000-acre Grapevine Fire in the Safford Ranger District of the Coronado National Forest. The blaze is burning at low elevation in grass and bush, and crews continued to hold the fire south of Highway 266 from the west side Forest Boundary east to Gillespie Wash, fire officials told KPHO-TV on Sunday. The fire has led to the closure of Coronado National Forest lands south of State Route 266, known as Greasewood and Kane Spring Mountains. No structures have been destroyed. Firefighters said the fire, which was caused by lightning, is 10 percent contained.

Gov. Dave Heineman has declared a state emergency due to the current drought conditions throughout Nebraska. The declaration allows state workers to help with emergency situations that arise from the drought, and frees up resources for the effort. It also gives greater flexibility to the Nebraska National Guard and the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency to use resources as needed. Heineman says the drought poses an imminent threat to the ability of local governments to respond. The governor has also directed the state Department of Roads to move up the scheduled start of roadside haying in 55 counties.

There is a risk of locally damaging thunderstorms on Independence Day, which could not only impact daytime picnics and festivals, but also evening fireworks in the Northeast.

Just about every major city and small community has some sort of fireworks display on or around the Fourth of July. However, storms erupting in over a dozen states could impact activities and have some folks running for cover.

Dry air nosed into the Northeast late in the weekend, reducing the risk of violent thunderstorms for a couple of days.

Unfortunately, another surge of humid air ahead of an approaching cool front could have the atmospheric volatility index on the rise for July Fourth from the Ohio Valley states to the mid-Atlantic and New England.

While not quite the same setup and crushing outcome as the Derecho of this past Friday and Saturday, thunderstorms that form in the afternoon and evening will have the potential to bring localized power outages from damaging wind gusts and frequent lightning strikes.

Brief downpours from the storms can also cause disruptions to outdoor plans.

The storms are likely to hit some areas that were missed (New England and the northern mid-Atlantic) by the Derecho and could overlap areas that were hit (Ohio Valley and the southern mid-Atlantic) by the system.

Southeastward progress of the cool front will be critical for the bulk of the thunderstorm activity.

Odds favor showers and thunderstorms to be in the vicinity of the Great Lakes during the morning and midday hours on Independence Day. Slightly cooler, more stable conditions are likely in the region by the evening.

During the afternoon, building storms are likely to be passing through the northern Appalachians and part of the Ohio Valley. Much of this area will clear out in time for evening fireworks, but a few places may not. Cities on the bubble with the storms include Cincinnati, Pittsburgh and State College.

During the evening, the risk of strong to severe storms is likely to extend from Boston to New York City, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., to the central and southern Appalachians.

Spotty storms and showers can erupt ahead of the “main batch of thunderstorms and linger in their wake.” The details of which may not be known until July 4th itself.

We will continue to update you on the situation. Be sure to check AccuWeather.com for the latest radar in your local area.

Since the holiday is in the middle of the week, there may be no desirable options for rescheduling fireworks, if storms come calling at the wrong time. Fortunately, most storms in this pattern will be brief. Despite some delays, the storms should generally move on in less than an hour.

In areas where rain falls and ceases just prior to fireworks, calm, moist conditions in its wake potentially could inhibit smoke from clearing, perhaps leading to poor viewing conditions.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Relentless heat gripped much of the eastern United States for a fourth straight day on Monday, with about 2.1 million homes and businesses without power after violent storms and soaring temperatures killed at least 18 people.

Power companies warned it could take several days to restore electricity completely in some areas as much of the United States sweltered in a heat wave. Two hundred and eighty-eight temperature records were set nationwide on Sunday.

“Above-normal temperatures will continue to affect a large portion of the country from the northern Plains to the Mid-Atlantic over the next few days,” the National Weather Service said.

Many areas will see temperatures from 90 degrees Fahrenheit to more than 100 degrees (37.7 C), it said in a statement. Excessive heat warnings and advisories remained over much of the mid-Mississippi Valley and southern states.

Severe thunderstorms were possible in Kentucky and Missouri and in the north-central states, the weather agency said.

Emergencies were declared in Maryland, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia and Washington because of damage from a rare “super derecho” storm packing hurricane-force winds across a 700-mile (1,100 kilometer) stretch from the Midwest to the Atlantic Ocean.

About 2.1 million homes and businesses from Illinois to New Jersey were still without power, with the biggest concentration in the Washington area.

With power lines down across the region, the U.S. government told federal workers in the Washington area they could take unscheduled leave or work from home on Monday and Tuesday.

Baltimore Gas & Electric said about 213,000 customers remained affected. Almost 1,200 utility workers from 12 states and Canada are helping restore power or are on their way to central Maryland, the company said.

A dust storm known as a “haboob” rolls into downtown Phoenix on Tuesday night, July 5, 2011. (AP Photo/Amanda Lee Myers)

Monsoon moisture will be on the increase across the Four Corners region this week, increasing the rain chances for the region and putting Phoenix at risk for another haboob.

A haboob is a type of intense dust storm carried by strong winds that are usually the aftermath of a thunderstorm.

Recent thunderstorms that have dotted the Four Corners region have produced more dry lightning strikes than substantial rainfall.

That will change starting Tuesday when the door is opened for monsoon moisture to start streaming northward.

The initial surge of moisture will help ignite a cluster of thunderstorms across southeastern Arizona and southern New Mexico Tuesday afternoon.

The desert areas of southern Arizona, including Phoenix, may then become the target of a haboob Tuesday night as these thunderstorms track westward. Gusty winds racing away from the thunderstorms would trigger the massive dust storms.

The added moisture in the air will also allow the thunderstorms to drop substantial rainfall Tuesday afternoon and night.

The same can be said across more of the Four Corners region as the week progresses and the monsoon moisture spills northward.

Significant rain-producing thunderstorms are definitely great news for a region where numerous wildfires are burning, but the welcome rain could come at a cost.

Too much rainfall in a short amount of time threatens to trigger flash flooding. Streams, creeks and arroyos could quickly turn into raging waterways.

Areas recently burned by wildfires are highly susceptible to not only flash flooding, but also mudslides with the severely charred soil not able to absorb the rain as quickly as normal.

Where the rain pours down on the burn areas in the mountains, the flooding rain and mud could flow down to impact the neighboring lower elevations.

Gusty winds racing away from the thunderstorms will not only be confined to the desert areas of Arizona but could also occur elsewhere across the Four Corners region. A shift or increase in wind where a wildfire is burning will create serious problems for firefighters.

AccuWeather.com meteorologists will also be monitoring the potential for some of the thunderstorms to turn severe with damaging winds.

Amateur Videos: Huge waterspout filmed on Sochi shoreline

Witnesses were able to film a huge waterspout moving along the shoreline near the Russian coastal city of Sochi. It closely passed vessels at sea before hitting the city with heavy rain and hail. There are no reports of damages.

Heavy rain that persisted for more than two hours from noon on Monday resulted in several major roads in George Town being cut off due to a flash flood. A check by Bernama found that among the roads that were affected were Jalan P. Ramlee, part of Jalan Perak, Jalan Logan, Kampung Makam, Jalan Sungai Pinang, Jalan Anson and Jalan Patani. The water level in certain areas rose to as high as 1.5 metres but no one was evacuated. However, the flood resulted in hundreds of vehicles being trapped for almost four hours due to traffic congestion. A senior officer of the Jalan Perak Fire Station, Shahrulnizam Che Hassan said the station had received a report from the public that a handicapped woman was trapped in her home. “During the incident at 1.44pm, the water level rose up to chest level and firemen had to break open the door of the 40-year-old woman’s house to take her out,” he said when contacted, here. He said the woman did not suffer any injury and had to stay with her neighbour until the flood subsided. A resident in Jalan P. Ramlee, Lee Eng Hong, 60, said his house was damaged by mud brought by the flash flood. He said he could not remove is car and motorcycle to higher ground as the flood occurred swiftly and the flood water entered his home. Meanwhile, Disaster and Operations Officer of the Department of Civil Defence, North-East District, Noor Mohd Saidi Noor Lajis said the department was monitoring the flood situation which was reported to be receding.

More than 55 people have been killed in landslides in southeast Bangladesh after three days of rains that triggered flash floods and severed transport links, officials said Wednesday. The army has been deployed to help with search and rescue efforts in the affected hill region of Chittagong, said the region’s chief administrator, Sirajul Haq Khan, who warned that the toll could rise. According to Khan, at least 26 people died in a series of landslides and flash floods in and around Chittagong port and the district of Cox’s Bazar. In neighbouring Bandarban district, 30 bodies have been recovered from multiple landslide sites, local administrator Tariqul Islam said. “Rescue efforts had been hampered as communications have been largely snapped because of flash floods and heavy rain,” Islam said. “Ten of the victims were children and scores of others were injured,” he said. Bandarban police chief Saiful Ahmed said most of the victims were asleep when the huge chunks of mud buried them alive. “One family has lost 12 members,” Ahmed said. Chittagong port received 40 centimetres (16 inches) of rain in a single 12-hour period on Tuesday. Flights in and out of Chittagong’s Shah Amanat International Airport have been suspended since Tuesday afternoon. According to the state Disaster Management Information Centre, around 50,000 people were affected by the flash floods, and many of them forced to take shelter on higher ground. Train links between Chittagong and the rest of the country were also severed after a railway bridge collapsed due to a rain-triggered flash flood.

Epidemic Hazards / Diseases

Two people died and more than 50 remain hospitalized in the eastern city of Manzanillo, where an outbreak of cholera required authorities to set up a quarantine at the Celia Sanchez Manduley Provincial Surgical Clinic,” reported the Miami-based Café Fuerte website, though there has been no confirmation or denial of the incidents in the official state-run media. “The hospital can’t cope, the aisles are full of stretchers with patients…now with more than 50 people, including children and adults who are hospitalized as a result of the disease,” was a statement attributed to Manzanillo resident Misleidi Calvente Figueredo. Calvente said several communities have been quarantined, while all Manzanillo health care workers have been mobilized. Police and State Security officers are reported to be guarding the medical center, according to testimonies received from residents. Fortunately, Cuba is not without experience in fighting cholera, as hundreds of Cuban doctors have worked in a campaign against the disease in the neighboring country of Haiti.

Biohazard name:

Cholera

Biohazard level:

2/4 Medium

Biohazard desc.:

Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.

A cholera out break has been reported at Karambo near Bunagana border post and Busanza border line at Uganda’s border with DR Congo, Kisoro District Health Officer Dr. Steven Nsabiyunva has said. The outbreak comes at the peak of the influx of refugees from DR Congo to Uganda. Speaking to the New Vision at his office on Friday, Dr Nsabiyunva said the district health team was considering making a quarantine to protect refugees already at Nayakabande refugee reception center and the district population at large. He urged health officials at Nyakabande to ensure proper use of mobile toilets and to emphasize hand washing. “We are considering isolating new comers as one way of controlling spread of the disease and protecting the district population. Cholera is spread through exposing food to excreta of an infected person. It is characterized by acute vomiting and diarrhea. If left untreated it can kill in 24 hours. Asked about cross border trade in food items, the doctor said his office was still trying to put in place control measures. In February this year, an outbreak of dysentery hit the camp and has reportedly lingered on due to poor disposal of excreta. “Saucepans are used for bathing and washing clothes while basins are used for serving food” said a source at the refugee center who preferred anonymity.

Biohazard name:

Cholera Outbreak

Biohazard level:

3/4 Hight

Biohazard desc.:

Bacteria and viruses that can cause severe to fatal disease in humans, but for which vaccines or other treatments exist, such as anthrax, West Nile virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, SARS virus, variola virus (smallpox), tuberculosis, typhus, Rift Valley fever, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, yellow fever, and malaria. Among parasites Plasmodium falciparum, which causes Malaria, and Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes trypanosomiasis, also come under this level.

24 Hours of Solar Flare Onslought! – July 2, 2012

Solar activity continued at moderate levels on Sunday with a pair of M-Class flares around Sunspot 1513. The largest of these events was an M2.8 flare at 19:18 UTC Sunday afternoon. Sunspot 1515 located in the southern hemisphere is largest region on the visible solar disk, but has so far only produced C-Class solar flares. Both 1513 and 1515 retain Beta-Gamma magnetic configurations and may produce additonal M-Class flares on Monday.

The solar wind remains above 600 km/s and minor geomagnetic activity will be possible at very high latitudes. Visible aurora will be possible around the polar regions. – Solarham.com

Earth Facing M5.6 Solar Flare + Coronal Mass Ejection – July 2, 2012

Strong M5.6 Flare – Sunspot 1515 Around 10:52 UTC Time – July 2, 2012. There is an associated coronal mass ejection which may have an earth directed component. However, early data from Stereo Ahead shows that it will mostly head south and miss us entirely. The next variable will be whether or not the coronal mass ejection cloud expands enough to encompass the Earth as well.

Big sunspot AR1515 erupted on July 2nd at 10:52 UT, producing an M5.6-class solar flare that almost crossed the threshold into X-territory. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded the extreme ultraviolet flash:

A pulse of x-rays and UV radiation from the flare illuminated Earth’s upper atmosphere, producing waves of ionization over Europe. Such waves alter the propagation of low-frequency radio transmissions. In Lofoten, Norway, Rob Stammes recorded the ionospheric disturbance using a 60 kHz receiver: data.

The eruption also hurled a CME into space, but not directly toward Earth. The south-traveling cloud could deliver a glancing blow to our planet’s magnetosphere on July 4th or 5th.

Biological Hazards / Wildlife / Hazmat

China’s northwestern Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region has reported an outbreak of H5N1 in poultry, the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) announced Monday. The disease has killed 1,600 chickens raised by the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps (XPCC), a unique economic and semi-military government organization of about 2.5 million people. A total of 5,500 XPCC-farmed chickens showed symptoms of suspected avian flu on June 20, according to the MOA. The National Avian Influenza Reference Laboratory Monday confirmed the epidemic was H5N1 bird flu after testing samples collected at the farm, the MOA said. Local authorities have sealed off and sterilized the infected area, where a total of 156,439 chickens have been culled and safely disposed of to prevent the disease from spreading, according to the MOA. Bird flu, or avian influenza, is a contagious disease of animal origin caused by viruses that normally infect only birds and, less commonly, pigs. It can be fatal to humans.

Biohazard name:

H5N1 – Highly pathogenic avian influenza virus

Biohazard level:

4/4 Hazardous

Biohazard desc.:

Viruses and bacteria that cause severe to fatal disease in humans, and for which vaccines or other treatments are not available, such as Bolivian and Argentine hemorrhagic fevers, H5N1(bird flu), Dengue hemorrhagic fever, Marburg virus, Ebola virus, hantaviruses, Lassa fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, and other hemorrhagic or unidentified diseases. When dealing with biological hazards at this level the use of a Hazmat suit and a self-contained oxygen supply is mandatory. The entrance and exit of a Level Four biolab will contain multiple showers, a vacuum room, an ultraviolet light room, autonomous detection system, and other safety precautions designed to destroy all traces of the biohazard. Multiple airlocks are employed and are electronically secured to prevent both doors opening at the same time. All air and water service going to and coming from a Biosafety Level 4 (P4) lab will undergo similar decontamination procedures to eliminate the possibility of an accidental release.

Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR-Bohol) raised an alarm against gathering and eating shellfish from the tide flats of Tagbilaran City bay following a suspected case of red tide. BFAR-Bohol head Cresencio Pahamutang explained the alarm is based on an algal bloom, which is what caused the red coloration in the waters (red tide) that witnesses observed on the sea below Matig-a Lodge along Burgos Street, Tagbilaran City. Pahamutang said BFAR confirmed the reports based on the latest results from the 10 monitoring stations set up at specific points between Dauis Bridge in Junction Mansasa to Maribojoc Bay. According to Pahamutang, a worker at the Matig-a Lodge reported the unusual discoloration in the waters, prompting the BFAR to investigate by going to their monitoring stations. From their tests, Pahamutang shared that from the usual three cells per liter average yield in the collecting stations, they noticed around 1,475 to 1,365 cells per liter. A total ban and alarm against shellfish gathering and eating was issued when the mirco-organisms monitored reach 10,000 units per liter, he explained. With the noticed unusually high concentration of algal micro-organisms in the Tagbilaran Strait, the BFAR said they have coordinated with the Provincial Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Management Council as well as Poblacion 1 Barangay Chairman Arlene Karaan to advise people to stop harvesting shellfish from the mentioned areas. Pahamutang said these algae, also called dinoflagellates have toxins that are usually absorbed by bottom feeding shellfish, making them unfit for human consumption. For fishes from the area, the BFAR chief said as long as the fish is properly prepared before cooking, it may not be affected as much.

Biohazard name:

Red Tide

Biohazard level:

0/4 —

Biohazard desc.:

This does not included biological hazard category.

Symptoms:

Algal bloom happens when an unusually large concentration of aquatic micro-organisms amass in a coastal area, often causing discoloration. When the algae is present in high concentrations, water can be discolored from murky, to purple to pink or red, thus, its common name the red tide.

One person was killed and ten were injured on Monday when a pipe of flowing hydrochloric acid exploded at a drilling installation operated by the Mekorot water company near Ein Yahav in the Arava region of the South. The injured were evacuated by helicopters and ambulances to Soroka University Medical Center in Beersheba. One person was in critical condition, four in serious condition, and five others were lightly injured. The Environmental Protection Ministry said there is no danger to area residents as a result of the explosion. After exploring the area, a team of ministry workers determined that the risk range is only 200 meters, and that the closest residential population is five kilometers away from the site. The staff members provided instructions to police officers on site as to how to properly protect themselves and enter the facility, the ministry added. MK Dov Henin (Hadash), chairman of the Knesset’s Joint Committee on Environment and Health, warned of the dangers that such glitches in a pipe system can cause and called for firmer regulations in response to Monday’s event. “Time and time again we see that the status quo in the field of hazardous materials in Israel is forfeiting the lives and health of citizens, workers and bystanders,” Henin said. “Glitches in hazardous materials are not inevitable and we can prevent them but in order to do this, a true revolution in regulations of this field is required.” Such new regulations, Henin explained, should include high standards for hazardous material facilities as well as for all the transmission systems associated with the plants. “I intend to convene the committee to discuss the accident that occurred and the lessons that need to be learned from it from corner to corner,” Henin said. Police closed Highway 90 to traffic in both directions.

A suspected chemical leak left 30 people needing medical treatment. A 400 metre exclusion zone was set up in Severalls Business Park in Colchester and hundreds were told to leave the area as noxious fumes filled the air.

Articles of Interest

By Jillian MacMath, AccuWeather.com Staff Writer

The above graphic is circulating on Twitter referring to the lockout of union workers from Consolidated Edison after reaching an impasse in contract negotiations. Tweeted by user J. Simone Posner.

Customers are fearing a blackout across New York state, as temperatures continue to push into the 90s this week and Consolidated Edison is without more than 8,000 of its utility workers.

Negotiations between Con Ed and the workers union collapsed on Sunday just hours after the existing contract expired, causing Con Ed to close its walk-in centers, suspend meter reading and limit work on major construction projects.

Negotiations between Con Ed and the union lasted more than ten days and involved various issues, such as pensions, wages and health care.

After Con Ed’s request for the union to sign a two-week contract extension fell through, Con Ed ordered that union workers not show up for work on Monday. The impasse was a result of Con Ed’s demand that the union not strike without giving seven days notice.

Con Ed said it is has trained managers working on essential operations in the absence of its utility workers, but the union has responded publicly that Con Ed managers don’t have the technical knowledge to handle serious problems.

This has many customers fearing the worst: a blackout amid a heat wave.

“So, is there a betting pool running to see how long it takes for a black out because of the ConEd lockout?” twitter user Allison Sommer’s tweeted this morning.

Garnering support for the union, a graphic is also circulating on Twitter, adorning the Utility Workers Union crest and the phrase “We didn’t strike, They locked us out.”

There’s no word yet how long the lockout will last, but Con Ed has stated that they will call in management retirees if it becomes necessary.

New York state may see severe, gusty storms across New York state Tuesday night through Wednesday, increasing the risk for power outages.

“The main concern with these storms will be strong and potentially damaging wind gusts, and locally flooding downpours,” said AccuWeather meteorologist Erik Pindrock. “There will also be just enough wind shear for an isolated tornado; however, that will not be the rule.”

It is not expected that the storms will be particularly damaging.

“Anyone that experiences a severe thunderstorm could face a loss of power; however, I don’t believe this particular setup will be close to as bad as what we saw last Friday with millions of people losing power,” Pindrock said.

But tensions remain high between Con Ed and many of its 3.2 million customers.

An earthquake measuring 5 on the Richter scale jolted many parts of Gujarat in the early morning on Wednesday but there were no reports of damage to property or loss of life.

A moderate earthquake was experienced today which had the epicentre at 26 km South South-East of Dholavira in Kutch district. Tremors were felt in Bhuj, Rapar, Bhavnagar, Jamnagar and Ahmedabad cities too, according to officials of Seismological department.

“Earlier a mild quake came. Then occurred the bigger jolt measuring 5 on Richter scale and it had the depth of 80 kms,” Institute of Seismological Research Director General B K Rastogi said.

“There were 27 aftershocks registered, in the magnitude of 1 to 3 on the Richter scale, and majority of them were in Kutch and Saurashtra region. But there are no reports of damage to property or the life,” he said.

Residents of Kutch region, which was devastated by a quake in 2001, rushed out of their homes in panic.

“In Ahmedabad also some people felt minor tremors but we have not received any panic calls,” said Chief Fire Officer M F Dastur.

Volcanic Activity

(Reuters) – A remote Aleutian volcano that has been restless for the past year rumbled to life, shooting a thin cloud of ash several miles into the sky, which could pose a slight hazard to aircraft, Alaska scientists said.

Cleveland Volcano, a 5,676-foot (1,730 meter) peak on an uninhabited island 940 miles southwest of Anchorage, had an explosive eruption at about 2:05 p.m. local time on Tuesday, the Alaska Volcano Observatory reported.

A pilot flying in the area estimated that the ash cloud rose to 35,000 feet above sea level, reported the observatory, which is a joint federal-state organization that monitors Alaska’s numerous active volcanoes.

However, satellite imagery shows only a weak ash signal, suggesting a thin cloud that dissipated quickly, said Stephanie Prejean, a U.S. Geological Survey seismologist at the observatory in Anchorage

“It was just one explosion, which was very typical of the thing Cleveland has been doing in the last year,” Prejean said. It is possible that the cloud rose to less than 35,000 feet, as the height was just one pilot’s estimate, she said.

Pilots have been advised of potential risks from Cleveland, which might explode again, Prejean said. “It could do that any time,” she said.

Cleveland has been in an off-and-on eruptive phase since last summer. The volcano has at times oozed lava out of its summit crater, punctuated by occasional small explosions, none of which had created clouds reaching above 20,000 feet until Tuesday.

Although Cleveland is one of the most active of Alaska’s scores of volcanoes, there is no on-site seismic monitoring equipment. The Alaska Volcano Observatory must rely on satellite imagery, records of lightning strikes, witness reports and other evidence to determine if an eruption has taken place, Prejean said.

That is in contrast to volcanoes closer to Anchorage, where the observatory has set up seismic-monitoring networks that allow scientists to see signals before eruptions happen, she said.

Before Tuesday, there had been an apparent slowdown in activity at Cleveland. The Alaska Volcano Observatory three weeks ago lowered the alert level for the volcano to a “yellow” advisory from the more urgent “orange” watch status.

“Obviously, it has some oomph left in it,” said Tina Neal, an Alaska Volcano Observatory geologist.

Meanwhile, two moderate earthquakes rattled the western Aleutians on Tuesday.

The first, registered at magnitude 6.0, hit Tuesday morning about 90 miles northwest of Attu, the westernmost island in Alaska’s Aleutian chain, according to the West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center. The second, at about noon, measured at magnitude 5.7 and was centered about 65 miles northwest of Attu, the center said.

There were no reports of damage in the largely uninhabited region, and no tsunami warning was issued, said David Hale, a senior watch stander at the center.

Extreme Temperatures/ Weather

Featured Videos

The Midwest heat wave is causing headaches for the Department of Transportation, as roads around the area are giving way.

Not only does this heat have an effect on people but the streets and pavement can only take so much. A curb at 33rd Street and Dakota Avenue in Sioux Falls buckled from the heat Tuesday afternoon. The DOT says these buckle problems can strike any patch of concrete at anytime.

For many Interstate-29 travelers, Monday’s trip had an unexpected bump that led to flat tires and delays. A section of the roadway buckled under the heat. An unpredictable occurrence, but not a rare one for our area.

“It all depends on how hot it gets, quite often we see them in late July and August but yesterday and today temperatures are in the low 90’s, it’s not uncommon to see that.” Said Greg Aalberg.

Aalberg is the engineering supervisor for the South Dakota Department of Transportation and says there’s not much you can do to prevent buckling.

Aalberg says all concrete has the potential to buckle, sometimes it’s streets others it’s sidewalks or medians. When the temperatures rise it forces the concrete to expand and in most cases the only place it can go is up.

like the old adage, something’s gotta give, and when it does Aalberg’s team is ready to roll.

“We get some asphalt in there for a temporary fix and then come back later and saw it all out and replace it with new concrete.” Said Aalberg.

Unfortunately for Monday’s travelers, they’re responsible for covering the damage to their vehicles. So when you’re out driving this summer, whether it be on the interstate or just around the block, remember these buckling buggers can strike at anytime.

“You can go through a day where it can get to 90 degrees and you may not have a blow up it’s just an unknown thing and we try and be as prepared as we can so that if it does happen we can respond.” Said Aalberg.

One of the DOT’s repair trucks was hit by a car while they were trying to patch the I-29 buckle. So it’s just another reminder to slow down when crews are on the roads.

Tropical storm Talim is forecast to strike China at about 09:00 GMT on 20 June.Data supplied by theUS Navy and Air Force Joint Typhoon Warning Centersuggest that the point of landfallwill benear24.7 N,120.3 E.Talim is expected to bring 1-minute maximum sustained winds to the region of around83 km/h (51 mph).Wind gusts in the area maybeconsiderably higher.

The information above is provided for guidance only and should not be used to make life or death decisions or decisions relating to property. Anyone in the region who is concerned for their personal safety or property should contact their official national weather agency or warning centre for advice.

This alert is provided by TropicalStorm Risk (TSR) which is sponsored by Benfield, Royal & SunAlliance,Crawford & Company and University College London (UCL). TSR acknowledges thesupport of the UK Met Office.

Residents evacuated their homes and animals escaped from their pens at a zoo as floods fed by a steady torrential downpour struck a city in northeastern Minnesota, officials said Wednesday. Police officers helped track down a polar bear that got out of its enclosure overnight at the low-lying Lake Superior Zoo where several animals drowned. Duluth Mayor Don Ness said he would declare a state of emergency after the deluge of up to 9 inches of rain that he said caused extensive damage to the port city of about 86,000. Ness said the order would start the process to obtain federal aid. Gov. Mark Dayton said he would travel to Duluth on Thursday to discuss how the state can help. Much of Duluth is spread along a steep rocky hillside overlooking Lake Superior so the water speeds downhill, carrying debris with it, Ness said. “There are certainly reports of streets being washed out, but the more significant problems are as the water comes over the ridge and starts rushing down the hill, overwhelming our storm systems, overwhelming our culvert system and creating that forward momentum of rushing water,” Ness said. “That’s where the most significant problems are being felt.”

The zoo lies at the foot of the hill, making it particularly vulnerable. Several sheep, goats and a donkey in the barnyard exhibit were killed by the flooding, said Susan Wolniakowski, director of guest services. It also provided an opportunity for Berlin, a female polar bear, to escape. “Even though it’s a large white object, it’s pretty nerve-racking,” police spokesman Jim Hansen said of the chase for Berlin, the female polar bear. Zoo officials said she was darted by the zoo’s vet and placed in quarantine. Peter Pruett, the zoo’s director of Animal Management, said the “entire staff is devastated” at the loss of the animals. Wolniakowski said no animals left the zoo grounds and all have been secured. “I think it’s probably been the worst flooding we’ve ever had at the zoo,” Wolniakowski said. A train depot was completely underwater, she said. Ness said more rain was expected later Wednesday, and that it may take time for the damage to become fully apparent. He said the volume of rain in a short period puts a tremendous amount of stress on sewer and road systems.

Several major highways leading into the city were closed because of the flooding and authorities encouraged residents to stay home because of the volume of standing and rushing floods, and the difficulty in spotting hazards under water, such as missing manhole covers. “It’s a mess. There are too many intersections to even list that are closed,” Hansen said. Authorities asked residents of the low-lying Fond du Lac neighborhood to leave their homes because of the rising level of the St. Louis River. Hansen said about a dozen homes were evacuated. The Red Cross opened two shelters for evacuees. The University of Minnesota Duluth campus closed Wednesday but planned to reopen Thursday.

Nuclear

PPL Corp. shut down the Unit 1 reactor at its Susquehanna nuclear power plant near Berwick on Tuesday to investigate what it called a minor water leak inside the container structure surrounding the reactor. Unit 1 had been online only 11 days since a 69-day shutdown starting March 31, during which the company repaired cracks in Unit 1 turbine blades. The water leak does not affect the safety of plant or the public, Timothy S. Rauch, PPL’s chief nuclear officer said in a press release Tuesday. While the leaking water may have been contaminated by nuclear material, all of it was captured in drainage systems inside the containment structure and none of it leaked outside, Joe Copelliti, a PPL spokesman said. “We made the prudent decision to shut down the unit while the leak is small and will return it to service after we make the needed repairs,” Rauch said. Unit 2 is generating electricity at full power, the company said. Unit 2 also had been shut briefly to search for turbine cracks, but none were found.

Epidemic Hazards / Diseases

Forty-one persons have been confirmed being infected by the 2009 influenza A(H1N1) at Nakhon Ratchasima Rajanagarindra Psychiatric Hospital, the Ministry of Public Health said, emphasising that the situation is under control. The patients are being closely monitored for two weeks to ensure that the epidemic will be contained. Public Health Ministry Inspector General Kamron Chaisiri said the infections were found in the Nakhon Ratchasima facility in the northeast in early June. Six female and 35 male patients have been admitted, including six who are hospital staff, he said. According to the initial investigation, one hospital worker was infected with the flu virus from his daughter who fell sick on June 8, with all members of the family subsequently infected with the disease. The hospital detected the first flu victim on June 12 in the ward for alcoholism patients. The ministry official said that such patients have weaker immune systems and are easily infected with disease. The patients were given the antiviral drug Tamilflu, and none have severe condition, he said, adding that the patients were separated for better treatment and care. Mr Kamron said the hospital has temporarily stopped admitting new patients until the situation is confirmed safe in two weeks but outpatient services are operating normally. Health officials have sampled the schools in the province and have discovered no other cases of bird flu infection.

Biohazard name:

A/H1N1

Biohazard level:

3/4 Hight

Biohazard desc.:

Bacteria and viruses that can cause severe to fatal disease in humans, but for which vaccines or other treatments exist, such as anthrax, West Nile virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, SARS virus, variola virus (smallpox), tuberculosis, typhus, Rift Valley fever, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, yellow fever, and malaria. Among parasites Plasmodium falciparum, which causes Malaria, and Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes trypanosomiasis, also come under this level.

World Health Organization is on high alert about new Ugandan outbreak, cause is not fully known

Updated:Added commentary from Jason Oh, a Johns Hopkins Univ. public health studies student who is currently in Uganda studying the disease post-conflict transformation. Mr. Oh described some of the symptoms in more detail, and offered different perspective from the CNN reporters’ experience.

CNN has also reworded their report to tone down the suggestion of violent behavior.

It’s called the “nodding disease” and it’s a baffling illness that has struck thousands of children in northern Uganda. The illness brings on seizures, violent behavior in some (debated), personality changes, and a host of other unusual symptoms.

I. Mental Degradation: Child Victims Have no Cure, no Future

Grace Lagat, a northern Uganda native, is mother of two children — Pauline Oto and Thomas — both of whom are victims of the disease. For their safety, when she leaves the house, she now ties them up, using fabric like handcuffs. She recalls, “When I am going to the garden, I tie them with cloth. If I don’t tie them I come back and find that they have disappeared.”

Reportedly the children gnaw at their fabric restraints, like a rabid animals — or “zombies” of popular fiction — in an attempt to escape. (This is based on CNN‘s commentary.)

(Jason Oh points out that the restraints are intended to protect the chidlren from harm, and from starting fires.)

The effort to restrain the children is not unwarranted. In one of the most bizarre symptoms of this tragic illness, children with the disease are reportedly setting fire to buildings in their communities. Coupled with the aimless wandering this disease provokes in victims, this is a deadly combination. More than 200 people have been killed in fires believed to be set by the zombified children.

(According to Jason Oh, there have been few reports of violent behavior. It is unclear where our primary source CNN received this information, though a reader suggested that a CDC report indicated that 10 to 15 percent of children were found to exhibit increased aggression. We were unable to locate this report.)

The disease is not new. It popped up in the 1960s in Sudan. From there it slowly spread to Libya and Tanzania.

The Uganda infections, though, are a new outbreak — a troubling sign. The jump into a new region could be pure coincidence, or it could indicate the disease has become more virulent or found a new transmissions vector.

Infected children typically have regular seizures, which are proceeded by a repetitive nodding of the head. This characteristic symptom has given rise to the unofficial title for the malady.

II. World Medical Organizations Racing for a Cure

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) and World Health Organization (WHO) have been tracking the spread of this frightening ailment. Dr. Joaquin Saweka says the scene in Uganda is horrific, stating, “It was quite desperate, I can tell you. Imagine being surrounded by 26 children and 12 of them showing signs of this. The attitude was to quickly find a solution to the problem.”

Yet the WHO and CDC are not fully sure what is causing the illness, which cripples children and turns them into mindless, violence-prone zombies. The best clue they have is that most of the cases occur in regions inhabited by “Black flies”, which carry the parasitic worm Onchocerca Volvulus. That worm is responsible for another dangerous disease dubbed “river blindness”, the world’s second leading cause of infectious blindness.

(Jason Oh states that CNN misunderstood this reference. While it’s true the cause of the disease is unknown and the literature papers on the topic indicate an overlap with part of the river blindness afflicted regions, but he feels this reference was only intended to “state the obvious”, not hypothesize causation.)

The illness may have something to do with Black flies (left, center) and their parasitic worm (right). [Image Source: WHO (left), Wikimedia Commons (center), Human Healths (right)]

However 7 percent of infected children live in regions not inhabited by the Black fly, so a link is speculative at best.

Children with the disease also frequently exhibit vitamin B6 deficiency, leading medical experts to believe that the disease may be nutrition related. However, infections by microbes, parasites, fungi, or even fungi/microbes carried by a parasitic host, can all lead to nutritional deficiencies.

Dr. Scott Dowell, director of global disease detection and emergency response at CDC, says the race is on to determine the cause and a cure. He states, “At first we cast the net wide. We ruled out three dozen potential causes and we are working on a handful of probabilities. We know from past experience an unknown disease could end up having more global implications.”

In the current cases children as old as 19 have been found to be stricken, with the majority of the worst symptoms being spread over the 3-11 age range.

One mystery surrounding the disease is the seizures themselves. While typically seizures are either randomly occurring or follow some singular cue/pattern, the nodding disease seems to have multiple triggers, including eating new foods, changing weather, and other changes.

(Jason Oh says CNN reporters messed up and that it’s familiar foods trigger the seizures, not unfamiliar ones like bars of chocolate.)

Seizure often leave the children soiled with urine and drooling. Local nurses are afraid to touch the infected. States local nurse Elupe Petua, “I feel, because I don’t know what causes it, I don’t even know how it transmits, when I touch them I feel that I can also get the infection because I don’t know what causes it.”

III. Medication is Ineffective

Anti-epileptic medication slows the onset of symptoms, but is unable to stop the progression of the disease. The seizures eventually leave many children unable to walk, only able to drag their bodies along the ground as flies tried to attack them.

The current treatment approach of anti-epileptics has done little to halt the illness.
[Image Souce: CNN]

(Jason Oh says that the diseases offers a tragic, slow mental degradation, taking years to develop. Affected children, embarassed about the nodding and afraid of infecting classmates often drop out of school, while still mentally capable. Eventually the seizures lead to the more severe symptoms mentioned in the intro — loss of speech, partial paralysis, personality changes, and — according to CNN — violence.)

The government of Uganda has come under criticism for not being vocal enough in addressing the tragedy and demanding foreign aid/research expertise. Local politicians have taken to transporting victims from affected villages by bus to city hospitals in order to force the issue into the eyes of the more affluent city-dwellers.

(Jason Oh adds some perspective writing, “Uganda had asked the CDC to investigate in 2009. Most of the backlash against the government is because the Ministry of Health has been slow to use emergency funds that the Parliament made available. They’ve established many local centers for Nodding Syndrome, but they are under-staffed and under-equipped. The kids are being referred to and transported to Mulago Hospital (famous for being in The Last King of Scotland) so the top doctors at Makerere University and in Kampala can monitor them.”)

The issue is yet another woe for a nation in which the impoverished majority was terrorized for years by warlord Jospeph Kony’s militia, dubbed the “Lord’s Resistance Army.”

Mr. Kony is currently wanted by the International Criminal Court on multiple counts of violent war crimes, including rape and murder. These offenses are punishable by death (life in prison), if he is ever brought to trial. (Jason Oh clarified that under the new Rome Statute of 2002, the ICC is not allowed to seek the death penalty, even in murder cases.)

IV. What if the “Nodding Disease” Found a Way to Reach the U.S.?

Dr. Saweka says that for all the hand-waving by the government about using better anti-epileptics and offering more funding, he appreciates and shares in the villagers frustration. He states, “People complain that it looks like the lives in developing countries have less value than the lives in the western countries. When you know the root cause, you address the cure. Now you are just relieving the symptoms. We don’t expect to cure anybody.”

Ugandans, grief stricken, feel somewhat abandoned by the government and the wealthy developed “First World”. [Image Source: CNN]

While the “First World” may not be focused on — or even aware of — the zombification that is leaving children in these African nations violent (debated), crippled shells of their former selves — tied like dogs — it is an issue that must be addressed. After all, viruses, bacteria, parasites thanks to the wonders of evolution can mutate and adapt to new environments and new transmission vectors.

Thus this zombie virus While reports of violence or strange behavior — like biting — are disputed, the disease is very serious. It may seem like a foreign issue to regions like the U.S. and EU who are struggling with their own financial crisises. But if the illness finds a way to broaden its spread, this outbreak could cripple children across the globe.

(A word of clarification… CNN has reworded their report slightly to tone down the suggestion of violent behavior. The reports of fire starting stand, but in the new context it’s possible these were just innocent accidents triggered by the childrens’ loss of coordination.

Articles of Interest

Floods, storms, earthquakes and a tsunami displaced 14.9 million people last year, 89 percent of them in Asia, according to an estimate by two Norwegian-backed agencies issued here Tuesday.

“The 10 largest disasters in terms of the amount of people displaced all took place in Asia, including multiple events in China, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Japan,” said Elisabeth Rasmusson of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).

“The worst were the prolonged flood disasters in China and Thailand, which together displaced over five million people.”

The estimate, issued on the sidelines of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio, applies to people who are internally displaced within a country.

But an accurate total of how many of the 14.9 million remain displaced is unclear because data is so sketchy, its authors said.

In northeastern Japan, 492,000 people fled their homes after the March 10, 2011 mega-quake and tsunami, according to the report, compiled with the Swiss-based Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC).

One year on, 344,000 of them still live in temporary accommodation, it said.

In terms of the proportion of national population, Sri Lanka was worst hit, for 685,000 people, or three percent of its populace, were uprooted from their homes by heavy seasonal rains and back-to-back floods.

Volcanic Activity

Bukittingi, W Sumatra, June 17 (ANTARA) – Mount Marapi in West Sumatra province spewed volcanic ash up to 500 meters into the sky on Sunday morning.

“The volcano spewed volcanic ash for about 10 minutes starting at around 08.30 a.m.,” Mubarak, who lived on the slope of the volcano said on Sunday.

“The volcanic ash fell on around the volcano`s slope,” he said.

Before spewing volcanic ash, the 2,891-meter high volcano released white thick smoke as high as 50 meters from its crater, he said.

Since its alert status was raised on August 3, 2011, the volcano had spewed white smoke and volcanic ash almost everyday, he said.

The Bukittinggi Center for Volcanology and Geological Disaster Mitigation (PVMBG) still maintains the volcano`s alert status at the second highest alert level.

“PVMBG still recommends keeping the volcano at the second highest alert status and declaring it off-limits to anyone climbing within 3 km of its peak,” PVMBG officer Warseno said.

The volcano has spewed thick smoke and volcanic ash almost every day since it began showing signs of increased activity on August 3, 2011.

Mt Marapi is one of the active volcanoes in West Sumatra. It sent out sulfuric volcanic ash 1,000 meters into the sky on August 3 last year. The ash fell onto a number of areas, such as Agam, Tanahdatar, Padangpariaman, and Padangpanjang.

The volcano last erupted in 2005.

When inactive, the mountains adjacent to Mt Singgalang and Mt Tandikek have always been a destination for climbers from within and outside West Sumatra. Also, every New Years, it is always crowded with mountain climbers. (ANTARA)

Mexico’s Popocatepetl volcano is showing more signs of activity. Nighttime footage from a permanent camera set up near the volcano showed it was belching out incandescent rocks and smoke. The National Center for Disaster Prevention has registered 68 exhalations of gas vapor and ash of medium intensity coming from the volcano in the last 24 hours. The volcano can also bee seen spewing ash in daytime footage. The volcanic mountain sits roughly halfway between Mexico City and Puebla with some 25 million people living within a 60-mile radius. Popo, as it is commonly known, has erupted small amounts of ash almost daily since activity began in 1994. Officials have not ordered any evacuations.

Extreme Temperatures/ Weather

Authorities are evacuating about 150 homes in eastern San Diego County as firefighters battle a wind-driven wildfire that has destroyed one structure. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection says the fire began Sunday afternoon in a rural area northeast of Campo and near the Golden Acorn Casino. It has consumed 200 acres of brush. Capt. Daryll Pina said the fire has destroyed one structure, but he hasn’t been able to confirm what it was. Officials shut down the road to the casino and patrons are being urged to stay inside. Meanwhile, a 2,200-acre wildfire that erupted Saturday in a remote area of Riverside County is 70 percent contained. Authorities say they expect full containment of the blaze burning between Beaumont and San Jacinto Monday morning.